I'm not 100% sure about Deakin. He definitely had great enthusiasm and was very different from the other RL administrators back then as he believed in promoting and selling the game. He had some bold ideas like the free jersey with a season ticket, and getting Langer over was a real coup as back then nobody outside Wigan used to sign the Aussie greats.

But the club still felt like it was run in an amateurish way when he was here. Others on here more in the know might know better but I remember hearing a few years later that some of the commercial deals that were signed when Deakin was here were not great and saddled us into contracts on bad terms. I think we were much better off with Andy Gatcliffe who made us a more professionally run organisation.

Still, Deakin did give us some energy in those 18 or so months he was here and signing Langer and getting a spike in crowds in 2000 was important in that it established us as a club that was at least trying to break out of mid-low table mediocrity. In the first few years of Super League it felt like we were rotting away, selling our best players and in danger of becoming SL also-rans.

This was an era where I used to go home and away a lot of the time and I remember noticing a shift in the type of fans we had, around that 2000 season. You get used to recognising the same faces at games and at club functions and I definitely remember seeing a lot of new people in 2000, more families, more women, including younger women, whereas before then it was a bit dominated by scallies and grumpy men (the type you'd see in "Pondlife corner"icon_wink.gif. Maybe we became a bit more "middle class". A bit like how football audiences changed after Italia '90 and Pavarotti.

I'd be interested to know how many fans we picked up during the Langer/Deakin era who stayed fans after that. If I was writing a book about the rebirth of the Wire leading up to the 3 Challenge Cup wins under TS, I'd start the story in 2000.

As far as I know Moran is major shareholder, but doesn't have massive involvement. Middleton is Chairman so has a greater involvement in the day to day, but not as majority shareholder.

I was told he has the casting vote on any decision

Well is this saying that SJM Holdings North Ltd is the major shareholder in Warrington Wolves? 4.72705078125:5