Superpilot,
None of the candidates were integrated students, they came from modular courses, some had trained in SA, some in Spain and the rest UK. Mixed nationalities, curiously only two British, however we do love talking ourselves into gloom and doom here!
I stand by my thoughts on the rating and no line training as I see these guys on a daily basis.. as for individual circumstances.. sure if your'e loaded and can sit things out, that's one view. The real problem is recency, and even the most experienced jet pilot will go off the boil after a few months, both technically and operationally, it,s simply a capacity thing, basically if we don't use it we loose it! If you can afford to keep current with sim practice in a multi crew environment, and bone up on the tech stuff, apart from the capacity you stand a chance... unfortunately most SSTR students are short of funds and this is not the case.
I interviewed a person yesterday, whom had spent over 100k getting the CPL, with ATPL credits and was looking at spending another 38k on a SSTR with line training.. the later made sense.. but 100k on an Frozen ATPL? Mind you they enjoyed the two years in the States doing it!