: Sat Dec 27, 2008 9:48 am  

af wrote:

Poor compared to who or what? I've demonstrated earlier that it's quite similar to that of Brian Noble at Wigan. It's certainly not markedly worse than his.

The same Brian Noble who inherited a Wigan side sliding toward relegation and a lot worse than the team he left and has since taken them to two consecutive GF eliminators since then, knocking out Steve McNamara's Bradford side in the play-offs in both of those seasons?

The same Brian Noble who has taken Wigan from a decidedly average side to a contender again while McNamara takes us from contender to decidedly average?

I would say his record at Wigan is quite a bit better than our man TBH.

: Sat Dec 27, 2008 11:29 am  

mystic eddie wrote: :? The same Brian Noble who inherited a Wigan side sliding toward relegation and a lot worse than the team he left and has since taken them to two consecutive GF eliminators since then, knocking out Steve McNamara's Bradford side in the play-offs in both of those seasons? The same Brian Noble who has taken Wigan from a decidedly average side to a contender again while McNamara takes us from contender to decidedly average? I would say his record at Wigan is quite a bit better than our man TBH. Check the Wigan board from time to time. There's people on there saying the same stuff about Nobby as you are about SM. Deano G wrote: I don't think last season was good enough and the run we had in the play-offs should not mask the fact that the regular season was poor, in fact totally unacceptable. I've had enough of us getting thrashed by Stains everytime we play them yet being very competitive with Leeds - that isn't good enough. Some of the performances this season, e.g. v Huddersfield have been absolutely disgraceful in terms of effort and passion. Noble wasn't to blame for all of this, frankly a team without a coach should have done better against Huddersfield than we did. The players have to take a big share of the blame and their attitude at times this season has been appalling (the ill disciplined whining to the media being a prime example of this). Barrett wanting to go back home early and the resulting dip in form of the best player in the competition by a country mile didn't help and that wasn't Noble's fault either, but ultimately as coach Noble does have responsibility for the underperformance of the team and the standards this season have not been acceptable in terms of performances, effort and discipline. I have no doubt that if Noble had presided over underperformance and ill discipline like this 15-20 years ago the people in charge at Wigan then would sacked him. Fortunately for BN and unfortunately for us standards at Wigan in all areas are not what they used to be... Noble has managed to buy himself some time but we need to have a good start to the season. If we don't he should go. Link. Now of course, there are Wigan fans that disagree, trying to spin things to make out he should be given more time... but I know what you think of people like that.

mystic eddie wrote: :? The same Brian Noble who inherited a Wigan side sliding toward relegation and a lot worse than the team he left and has since taken them to two consecutive GF eliminators since then, knocking out Steve McNamara's Bradford side in the play-offs in both of those seasons? The same Brian Noble who has taken Wigan from a decidedly average side to a contender again while McNamara takes us from contender to decidedly average? I would say his record at Wigan is quite a bit better than our man TBH. Check the Wigan board from time to time. There's people on there saying the same stuff about Nobby as you are about SM. Deano G wrote: I don't think last season was good enough and the run we had in the play-offs should not mask the fact that the regular season was poor, in fact totally unacceptable. I've had enough of us getting thrashed by Stains everytime we play them yet being very competitive with Leeds - that isn't good enough. Some of the performances this season, e.g. v Huddersfield have been absolutely disgraceful in terms of effort and passion. Noble wasn't to blame for all of this, frankly a team without a coach should have done better against Huddersfield than we did. The players have to take a big share of the blame and their attitude at times this season has been appalling (the ill disciplined whining to the media being a prime example of this). Barrett wanting to go back home early and the resulting dip in form of the best player in the competition by a country mile didn't help and that wasn't Noble's fault either, but ultimately as coach Noble does have responsibility for the underperformance of the team and the standards this season have not been acceptable in terms of performances, effort and discipline. I have no doubt that if Noble had presided over underperformance and ill discipline like this 15-20 years ago the people in charge at Wigan then would sacked him. Fortunately for BN and unfortunately for us standards at Wigan in all areas are not what they used to be... Noble has managed to buy himself some time but we need to have a good start to the season. If we don't he should go. Link. Now of course, there are Wigan fans that disagree, trying to spin things to make out he should be given more time... but I know what you think of people like that.

: Sat Dec 27, 2008 12:07 pm  

The Wigan side that Millward nearly sent into relegation was a decent squad on paper. They were struggling pretty bad with injuries and once they began regaining fitness and Whelan gave Noble half a million quid to sign Fielden, they were always going to improve. Sure, Noble deserves credit for saving their status in SL and is a very good coach IMO but I always felt he was in a pretty much no lose situation.

However I wouldn't say Wigan have done significantly better than us and are 'contenders'. They may well have reached the semi final's the last couple of years, but to me have never looked to have enough in them to seriously trouble Leeds or Saints in a GF. I think it is fair to say we haven't always shown our best against the top sides however we have remained competitive in SL as a whole.

We have a coach who has made mistakes along the way (find a coach in any sport who hasn't) but what he has done right is recognise the importance of getting our youth system back on track. An area that the top two clubs are very strong in and we needed to improve. Obviously the long term aim will take a few more years if indeed as we all hope McNamara and his staff have recruited the right young players. I agree that we could and should have done better with the squad last year and the failure to progress against Hull in the CC was probably the most disappointing aspect of last season for me. You could point to various reasons for that defeat.. tactics, poorer gameplan, individual mistakes, plus an incorrect video decision (we should be getting used to those by now though!).

So it's a mixed bag in my view, McNamara has done some good work and he also has to be held responsible for some poor results as well. I do honestly struggle to see why a small few are SO insistent to see him leave but can understand why the majority are keen to see some improvement this year (myself included). I don't think we have significantly improved the squad on paper for this season, but they do have plenty of improvement as a group. If we have another inconsistent year and we're once again ruing over missed opportunities in big games then perhaps the club will also agree that a fresh approach is needed.

I personally feel optimistic about next season, we have the players to cause a few upsets along the way. So for now.. can we start over once again? And resume this discussion towards the final part of the year? Hopefully we will all be saying McNamara got it right this year.. surely that is what we're all hoping for?

: Sat Dec 27, 2008 12:40 pm  

: Sun Dec 28, 2008 7:58 am  

Bully_Boxer wrote:

The Wigan side that Millward nearly sent into relegation was a decent squad on paper.

Eh???

This was a squad that contained the following players.....

Dennis Moran, Sean Gleeson, Kevin Brown, Oliver Wilkes, Tim Jonkers, Jordan James, David Vaeliki, Jerry Seuseu and Luisi Sione. Hardly decent.

That is, of course assuming we count the likes of Bryn Hargreaves, Sean O Loughlin, Danny Tickle, Wayne Godwin, Eamon O Carroll, Darrell Goulding, Danny Orr and Paul Prescott amongst the quality that makes up for the dross and makes the squad decent?

Bully_Boxer wrote:

We have a coach who has made mistakes along the way

Indeed we do. And despite his constant claims that he has learned from his mistakes he has done nothing to suggest he can address the problem thus far.

Bully_Boxer wrote:

I do honestly struggle to see why a small few are SO insistent to see him leave

Because he is not a very good manager/coach. Not too hard to understand TBH.

Bully_Boxer wrote:

I don't think we have significantly improved the squad on paper for this season,

Despite reassurances that the playing squad would be improved a great deal whenever we got Iestyn the Bradford scapegoats' wage off the books. Another false dawn.

Bully_Boxer wrote:

If we have another inconsistent year and we're once again ruing over missed opportunities in big games then perhaps the club will also agree that a fresh approach is needed.

Agreed, except for the part about ruing "missed opportunites in big games." Generally we are never really in contention in big games under SM so the odd bombed try makes little difference.

Bully_Boxer wrote:

So for now.. can we start over once again? And resume this discussion towards the final part of the year?

What does it matter to you? You could always avoid the thread if you do not want to read about it. Because, like it or not, the discussions about Steve McNamara will not go away until he can prove his detractors wrong and his backers right, or, as is probably more likely, vice versa.

: Sun Dec 28, 2008 10:19 am  

mystic eddie wrote:

Eh???

This was a squad that contained the following players.....

Dennis Moran, Sean Gleeson, Kevin Brown, Oliver Wilkes, Tim Jonkers, Jordan James, David Vaeliki, Jerry Seuseu and Luisi Sione. Hardly decent.

That is, of course assuming we count the likes of Bryn Hargreaves, Sean O Loughlin, Danny Tickle, Wayne Godwin, Eamon O Carroll, Darrell Goulding, Danny Orr and Paul Prescott amongst the quality that makes up for the dross and makes the squad decent?

And the quality of Gareth Hock, Pat Richards, Brett Dallas,Iafeta Paleaaesina, Micky Higham plus other experienced players such as Calderwood and Logan. So yes I think they did have a 'decent' squad.

You might consider that a relegation material side.. but in 2006 that should have been good enough to be steering clear of relegation!

No. Name Position
1 Michael Platt
2 Waine Pryce
3 Michael Shenton
4 Luke Dyer
5 Damien Blanch
6 Paul Handforth
7 Andy Kain Stand
8 Danny Sculthorpe
9 Andrew Henderson
10 Danny Nutley
11 Keith Mason
12 Tommy Haughey
13 Ben Roarty
14 Deon Bird
15 Craig Huby
16 Matthew Whitaker
17 Richard Fletcher
18 Aaron Smith
19 Gray Viane
20 Richard Fa'aoso
21 Willie Manu
22 Paul Franze
23 Ryan McGoldrick
24 Ryan Boyle
25 Grant Edwards
26 Michael Knowles
27 Danny Ward
28 Brad Davis
29 Peter Lupton
30 Adam Fletcher
31 Danny Brough
32 Jason Payne

1 Colum Halpenny
3 Jason Demetriou
4 Jon Whittle
5 Semi Tadulala
6 Ben Jeffries
7 Sam Obst
8 Darrell Griffin
9 David March
10 Michael Korkidas
11 David Solomona
12 Jamie Field
13 Monty Betham
14 Paul White
15 David Wrench
16 Jamie Rooney
17 Duncan Macgillivary
18 Olivier Elima
19 Kevin Henderson
20 Austin Buchanan
21 Mark Field Full Back
22 Mark Applegarth
26 Ned Catic
27 Tom Saxton
28 Ryan Atkins
29 Adam Watene
30 Tevita Leo-Latu
31 James Evans

I know which side I would have chosen at the start of 2006. Wigan had enough quality in the side to keep them well clear of relegation, but a mixture of crippling injuries and Millward apparently losing the dressing room resulted in their slump. Noble deserves credit for saving them from relegation.. but I thought when he took the job that he couldn't really lose. If they were relegated then the fans would blame Millward, if he got them safe then he would be a saviour for about 6 months.

Quite a few Wigan fans are calling for him to be sacked now...perhaps they don't agree with your assessment that they're 'contenders'?

As for the rest.. it has been discussed at length many times over..I'll leave the broken record impersonation to you.

: Sun Dec 28, 2008 12:14 pm  

In 2006 wigan had
ashton
dallas
vaeliki
richards
calderwood
orr
dobson
fielden
higham
paleasina
hock
tickle
oloughlin
moran
brown
fletcher
godwin
hansen
seuseu
hargreaves
radlinski
mcavoy

before you get to the likes of jonkers, wilkes etc..yes its not what they started with and noble brought a couple in to help fight the relegation but that team would still beat the team we have now.

: Sun Dec 28, 2008 4:18 pm  

Bully_Boxer wrote:

As for the rest.. it has been discussed at length many times over..I'll leave the broken record impersonation to you.

You do that then. That will be fine. Many thanks.

: Tue Dec 30, 2008 1:28 am  

mystic eddie wrote:

...And despite his constant claims that he has learned from his mistakes he has done nothing to suggest he can address the problem thus far.

"He has done nothing"
Bollox. Unprovable either way, rhetorical and thus bollox.
"the problem thus far"
self-aggrandising bollox, presupposing that McNamara and you both know what THE PROBLEM is, and you would know when he had "addressed" this mythical problem.

mystic eddie wrote:

..Because he is not a very good manager/coach.

Again arrogantly spouting your minority and extremist views as if they were a given and universally acknowledged fact, thus yet more bollox.

mystic eddie wrote:

..Despite reassurances that the playing squad would be improved a great deal whenever we got Iestyn the Bradford scapegoats' wage off the books.

Can you post a link to when McNamara gave this assurance, or would your weird claim be perchance just more . . . bollox?

mystic eddie wrote:

...Generally we are never really in contention in big games under SM

. .. a comment proving (not that you deny it) that you don't actually watch us play. So more bollox, then.

mystic eddie wrote:

..the discussions about Steve McNamara will not go away until he can prove his detractors wrong and his backers right,...

Newsflash - they've already gone away. Everyone else pretty much seems to agree at least that McNamara has done passably well under difficult circumstances, has the clear support of the players, and has earned a crack at another SL season. You are a one-man detractor campaign, repetitively chanting away like a demented prayer wheel on speed in a Category 6 hurricane, yet have persuaded yourself that you are the spokesman for the nation. Bollox I know, but the thing is, you really do believe it.

: Tue Dec 30, 2008 7:52 am  

Ferocious Aardvark wrote:

Can you post a link to when McNamara gave this assurance, or would your weird claim be perchance just more . . . bollox?

When we announced our 2008 signings the coach said that he will be looking to bring in some "marquee players" for the 2009 season when we had more money to play with. I cannot find the exact T&A link but I cannot really be bothered indulging you TBH. However, it was there, I assume you saw it too. Plenty on here have done also.

As for the rest of your post? Oh dear. No need to start resorting to sweary words. That really is a sign that you are struggling badly.