You start with 'To be fair' so let's be...

Our 'backup' players are expected to slot in and play as if they've always been there and they haven't. New players need time to bed in and so do players that aren't playing regularly. I wasn't disappointed with our 'backup' players today. I was disappointed in some of the lazy play and lack pf vision by some our more experienced players to be fair!

how does that work then.

Rather than text you, he could just point you to last season when we played weakened teams in loads of games and won the cup and got to the Grand Final.

New players need time to bed in? Only at Warrington.

Wigan, Saints, Leeds put young lads in at will and they look like they have played every week.

Who are we counting as back up players?

I assume people just mean O'Brien and Evans who have each played 20 odd first team games so nearly a full season under their belts, plus Currie (who was on the bench today) has had about half a season under his belt in terms of SL appearances.

But anyway three young players in a 17 is not really unusual for Super League. Also these are the three players that we regard as the cream of our upcoming talent.

The rest of the team was Ratchford, Riley, Atkins, J Monaghan, Myler, Carvell, Higham, Hill, Grix, Westwood, Cooper, Waterhouse, Harrison, Wood.

Which ones of those do we not count as first teamers? If we're trying to count Higham, Grix and Cooper as second string then we're scraping the barrel of that argument I think.

We aren't seeing inconsistent results this year because Tony Smith is selecting weakened squads and underestimating the opposition. We are probably seeing that there is a huge difference when you take out these four players:

Briers
Hodgson
Michael Monaghan
Morley

Unfortunately as all of them are coming to the ends of their careers, what we are also seeing is a vision into the future of the next couple of seasons.

The team line up we saw today is the sort people post on here as their "Warrington 2015" teams (minus Waterhouse, Wood etc) along with comments like "the future is bright". I am always criticised for being negative, but I still think this "future's bright" team is a decent upper mid table team not Grand Final winners potential team. It will need about 4 top class signings, which hopefully we will secure with the salary cap freed up by the retiring big guns.

My letter would read along the lines of;
Dear Tony Smith
Thanks for the good times can we have some more please?

If i was really writing a letter

Dear Tony

If you only had £1 in your pocket right now, and i dropped you off at poundland what would you buy

Yours sincerely

HY

No-one expects or wants any players to be pilloried in public
Everyone knows some things need to kept, and said, behind closed doors
No-one wants a shakesperian eulogy after every game

But, Tony, sometimes [iknowing[/i you're angry, disappointed, hurt or annoyed isn't enough ... I want to [isee[/i it.

should of played the strongest possible team today then rested whoever on monday. widnes was always going to be a tough game as their home form has been faultless really. despite only winning once. they would of probably won all 3 had they kept 13 men on field

We've won and lost games without Brier, Hodgson, Monaghan, Morley etc. We dont expect to win every game. London last year was one of those games that the tactics were "justified" by the result the week later. Salford last year and Widnes yesterday had two things in common........a side who were more than capable of beating the opposition but who didnt turn up. Its not a case of Smiths team selection its player motivation. Regardless of fitness or ability the other factor which comes into play is "are they proud enough to wear the jersey". The advantage most of the players have for Monday is they only have to wait 3 days to show the fans that they do really want to play for Warrington.

A Crunchie 4 pack

Good debate on here chaps. For me forget which team was sent out, the most hurtful thing is whether they have the desire and hunger to win a game. Yesterday when the chips were down not one of the senior players was getting the lads in a huddle and ripping into them.
What yesterday also shown for me was two other discussion points.
1, standard of referring in our game is awful, not that I am blaming your mr Harry potter for our defeat but he sure didn't help
2, kills me say this, but what a great game mr hock had yesterday. Head and shoulders best player on the pitch, also one player who wanted to win the game

Good summary. Yesterday the game was about desire and it seemed to me that Warrington were not being motivated on the field, whereas Jon Clarke and Shaun Briscoe were talking to their team the whole time.

Denis Betts seems to have got Gareth Hock to play Rugby League as we all know that he can and he had a great game.

I agree that we should forget the team that goes on to the field. We had a few missing, too but the replacements fitted in OK.

And a good crowd, too!

Agree the crowd seemed to be in the main in good spirits, seen on here about richie getting some abuse when leaving.
As per the norm can't legislate for the silly minority
Monday is going to be a great chance for the lads to show we have the hunger the fans want to see, forget the fact it's about doing a Leeds and peaking atend of season, I don't buy that for one minute, it's about putting on a consistent performance and effort, so far we've seen a couple of Examples of neither being there
Cheers