A poor performance, especially considering Widnes were down to 12 men, lost Kevin Brown and Danny Tickle. Some positives to take from the first half include the link up play between the half backs and our forwards, particularly Bateman. Logan Tomkins looked solid and Sutton put himself about.

We lost the intensity in the second half. The tries conceded were soft. Gelling and Bowen both should have done better in their respective defensive roles. Dropping the ball cold and giving away penalties is forgivable early in the season but our lack of direction in attack, especially with a man extra and some very fortunate penalties is disappointing.

We need to calm down as well. Too many scuffles and Joel's attack on Phelps was just bloody stupid. Teams will wind Wigan up this season after the Flower saga and if we carry on reacting we'll have more red cards than we'll care to count.

Fair play to Widnes though, performed exceptionally throughout, never gave up and Joe Mellor deserved MOTM. Wigan made it their aim to smash him at every opportunity to make him cower. He didn't. Fair play.

All we can say is we didn't lose and next week is an opportunity to improve.

I agree with your sentiment but we won our opening game in 2013, hammering Salford 42-0

My bad, but we do have an awful "first up" record

When Wane took over from Madge he said he was going to cut out performances like that v Widnes as he felt we lost too many winnable games. I know we didn't lose the game but its exactly the kind of performance he was on about. And there have been several such games ever since Wane has been in charge, notably one against Widnes a couple of seasons ago and one at home to a very poor Bradford side as examples.

I don't think some slow start syndrome cuts it as an excuse when the coach says he wants to eradicate performances like that. In the Widnes game he had a half time team talk to sort the tactics out v 12 men but you wouldn't have thought so given the way the team played.

To be honest I'm pretty sure all top teams still give up shock losses. It's good that Wane has those aims but I do struggle with his arrogance sometimes. Regardless of their respective trophy hauls I wouldn't put him level with Maguire.