IN the end, inevitably, it comes down to winning games.
If the Newcastle Knights are winning games, they'll make the play-offs.
If they're winning play-offs, they'll challenge for premierships.
And if they're winning premierships, the whole perception of the club will change, because everyone loves a winner.
Winning games, of course, is easier said than done, and it's no coincidence that the clubs who do so habitually are invariably those who have stockpiled the highest-calibre personnel.
And therein lies the Catch-22 dilemma the Knights are facing, as highlighted by Dominic Young's decision this week to join the Sydney Roosters at the end of the season.
Winning games has been a problem for the Knights for a long, long time, and the defection of one of their brightest young prospects to a heavyweight opponent is a reminder of Newcastle's unenviable position in the pecking order.
Knights officials are entitled to take the view that they did everything in their power to retain the English winger they initially recruited as an unknown teenager, offering him a reported $2 million, four-year deal to re-sign.
But that is unlikely to provide any great solace for their long-suffering fans, who regarded Young's spectacular rise last year as one of the few positives to emerge during a season that ranks among the bleakest in the club's history.
The Knights are already under scrutiny for some of their recruitment-and-retention decisions of recent times.
Did they pay too much to re-sign Kalyn Ponga on a massive five-year deal that made him one of the NRL's highest-earning players?
Why did they usher David Klemmer out the back door when he was arguably their best performer last season?
Why do so many Knights discards - such as Zac Hosking, Grant Anderson, Jacob Kiraz and now Kurt Donoghoe - seem to be popping up at rival clubs?
In all those cases, the powers-that-be apparently felt those players were surplus to requirements. That's part and parcel of the business.
But Young is a different matter altogether, because Newcastle were not surprisingly keen to keep him.
After Kiraz scored a hat-trick of tries in Canterbury's upset win against the Knights last season, coach Adam O'Brien admitted: "You're going to have ones who come back and hurt you."
Young could potentially be inflicting pain on Newcastle for the next decade or more.
At 21, he has already scored 18 tries in 26 NRL games for a struggling team.
There would appear no reason to doubt he can maintain, or even improve, that strike rate on the end of a star-studded Roosters backline. Barring injury, with his rare blend of size, speed and agility, he could conceivably develop into one of the most prolific try poachers of his generation.
If previous Knights administrations paid a high price for allowing Boyd Cordner, Josh Jackson and Latrell Mitchell to slip through their fingers, at the time all three were juniors, and there was no guarantee they would eventually make the grade.
Young, on the other hand, has already showcased what he's capable of.
Yet like Connor Watson, who returned to the Roosters last year after four seasons at the Knights, and Josh King (Melbourne), the towering speedster from Huddersfield has decided the grass looks greener over the fence.
Finances were presumably a factor in his decision. Maybe the Roosters' offer was too good to refuse.
But the suspicion is that, like Watson and King, Young believes he will be a better chance of realising his potential at a stronger club.
Given it is now a decade since the Knights last won a play-off game - and the Roosters have celebrated three premierships in that time - it's hard to argue with such logic.
There is, of course, only one surefire remedy. Start winning games.
Now would seem as good a time as any.
To see more stories and read today's paper download the Newcastle Herald news app here.
Or if your story has open comments:
WHAT DO YOU THINK? Join the discussion in the comment section below.
Find out how to register or become a subscriber here.
