Exactly right; most importantly that ridiculous "duty of care" attitude that held so many of our youngsters back.

spot on

One of the strange paradoxes of this situation is that, while most people are in agreement that IL deserves massive praise, one of the things he deserves praise for most IMO is having the guts to replace Noble.

At the end of last year, IL was under a lot of pressure from some quarters to retain him. I'm not quite sure why - though the Sky presenters' desire to see Nobby stay at Wigan is easily understandable - but that last day of 2009, when Wigan lost gallantly at St Helens, must have been very difficult for IL. We'd been brutalised into accepting less, and suddenly, because we'd played well in a semi (but still lost), Nobby seemed to many of us like a good coach. In fact, IL got slagged off by quite a few people afterwards for not retaining him - right up until the announcement that Maguire was coming.

So where does this leave our affection for Nobby, in comparison, say, to our affection for IL (who clearly got it 100% right)?

I'll still give Nobby some credit, mainly for the Great Escape - but lets be fair, that's four years ago. Do any of us really believe that, if IL had given in and kept him for this year, we'd have had the season we've just had? I reckon we'd have finished about fouth or fifth and probably would not have got close to reaching the final.

Surely that puts things into perspective?

Nobby did a good enough job with us but then again after Basil Fawlty things just couldn't have got any worse could they! He has done a great job at Crusaders and turned them into a pretty decent competitive team but think if he is hoping to get a job overseas then Catalans is as far as he should be looking and not the NRL. I am not ungrateful for what Nobby did but it was time to move on, if he had stayed we would still be hearing speeches about rattling pots and pans, the same 17 would have been named week in week out, Darryl Goulding would still probably be at Salford and the young players who have done so well and given their all this year would still be playing in the under 20's or farmed out to other teams somewhere.
Thanks Nobby but an even bigger thank you to Ian Lenegan for finding the diamond that we have in our midst at the moment and for pairing him with the likes of Shaun Wane and Kris Radlinski - what a master stroke.

IMO Noble deserves credit for putting this bunch of players together. For if Maguire hadn't had this level of quality to start with the finish line could have been much sooner.

They may be the SAME names that noble left. BUT they are not the same players he left, they have a completely different attitude, different fitness levels, and different results, in that respect they are 100% Maguire's men.

Thank you for getting us to this starting point Brian.