Re: Sorry to say it, but how good do Wigan look? : Wed Feb 29, 2012 1:35 pm  

Div wrote:

....you forgot to mention number 4 - our defence , especially on the goal line has not been good enough thus far.

Indeed. We did well in the first half because we starved Catalans of possession and severely limited their time in our half. It was good, but it served to mask our deficiencies when it comes to defending our line. Pretty much every time Catalans started a set in our half it was a guaranteed try, and this has been the case in all the games so far. It reminds me a little of England's defence in the world cup.

Sort that out and the rest will follow.

Re: Sorry to say it, but how good do Wigan look? : Wed Feb 29, 2012 3:19 pm  

Lets get my original post into perspective here.

SaintsFan and Northampton Saint in particular.

I am probably one of the least fickle saints fans you will ever meet, and we look as though we have gone backwards from last season, even the early season form is worse than last years.

I was pointing out that Wigan look better than last year and are streets ahead of us at the moment, we need to up our game to match them but unfortunately i'm not sure if we have it in us this year. Losing KC and Jammer in the past 2 season has really hit this team.

Re: Sorry to say it, but how good do Wigan look? : Wed Feb 29, 2012 6:01 pm  

Get a reality check guys !!

Its only four weeks since the Wigan boards were suicidal because they lost with virtually a full strength team to that set of 'minnows' from Huddersfield with nine regulars out and were asking for 'Boo' to be put back to stand off !! and questioning whether they should keep Wane !!!!

Since then they beat Leeds fair enough but also Bradford and Castleford and put them away as a Wigan team on a roll always will..... but to be fair us 'minnows ' would expect to win at Bradford and Castleford this season !! as surely would Saints !! Yes decent side Wigan but so are we and so are Saints I wouldn't expect wigan to put significant points on either of us on our own 'middin' and if we get our full side out i would expect to beat them at home !!

Re: Sorry to say it, but how good do Wigan look? : Wed Feb 29, 2012 6:08 pm  

TheJudge wrote:

even the early season form is worse than last years.

Nonsense - we've so far lost narrowly (and by some accounts perhaps unluckily) to an almost certain top 4 team, and drawn at a ground where we always normally manage to find spectacularly entertaining ways to lose. In both of those games we were apparently the better team for most of it but just faded towards the end.

I saw both of the games against Wire and Harlequins last season - in no way have we even come near to the dire level of performance we put out in those 2 games, Quins in particular. We'd have lost by 50 against Cats if we had...

Any way you cut it, we're looking better and stronger now than at the equivalent point last season.

Re: Sorry to say it, but how good do Wigan look? : Wed Feb 29, 2012 6:21 pm  

Until all the teams have at least played each other once, i'll reserve judgement to who i fancy for the GF and CC, Catalans are not all that, Saints just collapsed after being on top for most of the game and i can't see other teams in the same position doing the same. Freak win that for me.

Saints will come good, i just think it's the early season jitters/finding your feet taking a bit longer that than it usually does for Saints, the only real test Wigan have faced is Hudds and came up short.

Leeds had other things on their mind and i'm sure if that game had been played a few weeks later rather than a week before the WCC the game would have been a lot closer.

Re: Sorry to say it, but how good do Wigan look? : Wed Feb 29, 2012 6:33 pm  

St pete wrote:

Why Would it take this long to know his best team? It's not as if we've signed 6/7 players in. We've lost pryce, eastmond, graham and Moore and replaces them with laffranchci, hohaia and flanaghan.

I've just got a feeling he ain't got clue what hes doing and last season spared him the blushes with the injuries.

By rotating players this year, he's completely contradicted himself as last year his favourite excuse was he can't fiend the same side. The injuries was a blessing in disguise for him.

My biggest worry from Royce being in charge is the recruitment. I'm pretty certain he will be on a one way flight back to oz at the end of the year but god help the next coach that's got to sort the mess of recruitment he will leave behind!

I can cope with no old Trafford appearance this year but his methods will set us back years and years.

I don't know what our best team is, do you? Last year, we were pretty much forced into a certain side due to injuries. This year we haven't suffered as badly (touch wood) and therefore have options. At full back we have Wellens, Hohaia, Lomax and Makinson who could all play there. On the wing we have Foster, Gardner and Makinson. In the halves we have Hohaia, Lomax, Gaskell and Wheeler. We don't know our best props yet either. I think Royce is struggling to pick his best side hence the rotation and hence a bit of struggle to find some consistency. Hopefully he'll find the right balance soon and we'll see a more consistent team.

Whilst I have doubts over Simmons I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt as he took us to a Grand Final and was close to taking us to the Challenge Cup Final last year too.

Re: Sorry to say it, but how good do Wigan look? : Wed Feb 29, 2012 6:41 pm  

Blobbynator wrote:

I don't know what our best team is, do you? Last year, we were pretty much forced into a certain side due to injuries. This year we haven't suffered as badly (touch wood) and therefore have options. At full back we have Wellens, Hohaia, Lomax and Makinson who could all play there. On the wing we have Foster, Gardner and Makinson. In the halves we have Hohaia, Lomax, Gaskell and Wheeler. We don't know our best props yet either. I think Royce is struggling to pick his best side hence the rotation and hence a bit of struggle to find some consistency. Hopefully he'll find the right balance soon and we'll see a more consistent team.

Whilst I have doubts over Simmons I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt as he took us to a Grand Final and was close to taking us to the Challenge Cup Final last year too.

It's not my job to know what the best team for the club is, it's Royce Simmons job. This is the coach that decided against pre season games and then starts to experiment during the season with his line ups!

I stand by everything I said, he'll set us back years with his crazy methods and completey shocking recruitment.

Great guy, crap coach!

Re: Sorry to say it, but how good do Wigan look? : Wed Feb 29, 2012 6:49 pm  

Wellens needs putting to pasture or sold to Widnes.

You need more grunt up front.

Foster needs to sort his D out rather than his hair.

Simple really

Re: Sorry to say it, but how good do Wigan look? : Wed Feb 29, 2012 7:38 pm  

Horatio Yed wrote:

Wellens needs putting to pasture or sold to Widnes.

You need more grunt up front.

Foster needs to sort his D out rather than his hair.

Simple really

Add to that decide upon and stick with a half back combination, sort the defence out and we're sorted.

Re: Sorry to say it, but how good do Wigan look? : Wed Feb 29, 2012 8:37 pm  

Horatio Yed wrote:

Wellens needs putting to pasture or sold to Widnes.

You need more grunt up front.

Foster needs to sort his D out rather than his hair.

Simple really

it really is that simple.

Yes in an ideal world we'd have 2 more international props and a 30 yr old tommy Martyn with 20 yr old knees but our current squad could win things if organised and drilled well.