Manera, He's awesome, he's gonna play more and he's less likely to turn off any potential players. Also, I reckon once people see Gemmell as a recruit, they'd automatically see your team as trying to 'buy' their way into success, as opposed to building their players and a club from the ground up, so they start to resent the new team which hurts player recruitment. The same should be true for Manera as well, but he tends to fly under the radar.
Funny coming from a Raven, the Roosters of CricSim. You might not quite buy players soley to win the comp, but you don't exactly sign many people up early in their time here... Usually give them a season or 2 and take them from whoever gave them a start
You seem to be forgetting Merk - The reason why the Ravens have decided to never go against this policy again.
I wasn't really criticizing the idea of 'buying' a team, as you definitely need to do it to some extent when you first enter the comp to be competitive. However, signing someone with the status of Gemmell when you're first starting a team turns you from the un-threatening new team into a threat, so the existing clubs start bad-mouthing you, which hurts recruitment (unless you're trying to be like the Redbacks, ie. folded after 2 seasons).
I thought you were critcising the signing of star player like Gemmell that the clones did but your post that you made while I was writing that showed you werent.
