No it’s not the latest blue movie release, but was just on the Wire site with a good thread on opposition players who you ‘love to hate’ for being very good and wishing they were in your team and yet finding them annoying , and that got me thinking about hard players

I know there are no soft men of rugby league, I only played for a couple of seasons myself when I was at Uni and that was enough for me. So respect to them all, but which players would you say, from Wigan or otherwise would you class as the true hard men of rugby league?

Also, are there less about nowadays, or not?

My starters for 10 – (watching since 1980) Dean Bell, Ian Roberts, Shaun Wane, Andy Farrell, Jamie Peacock

Past: Barry McDermott, Andy Farrell, Terry Newton, Terry O'Connor
Present: Adrian Morley, Jamie Peacock, Mark O'Meley, Keith Senior (I tried not to pick any proper houses but come on, like him or loathe him he's still pretty hard)

Brian McTigue.
If you ever get the chance ask Alex Murphy about Macs exploits v the Aussies on the 1962 tour.

On of my favourite stories about McTigue was in a test match when Mac, at a scrum got his hands up the opposing props jersey and grabbed handfuls of his oppos under arm hair.

Mac, ever so politely whispered into the props ear, "Do you want it hard or f***ing hard"

Graeme West, Kurt Sorenson, Kevin Ward, Greg Dowling, Ian Roberts, Mark Geyer, Jim Mills.

Warrington had their share of hardmen and lunatics in the 80s and early 90s. Kevin Tamati, Les Davidson, Steve Roach, Les Boyd, Des Drummond, Bob Jackson.

garry connoly for me tough as old boots that lad.

Shaun Wane, Kel Skerret, Andy Farrell & Terry Newton.

One great story I was told was about the 2nd row pairing of Nick du toit and Andy goodway.

Du toit would hit you all day where as goodway would hit you once and you would stay hit.

I've been privileged to see some real hard nuts of the game such as Billy melling , karalius , les boyd, Greg dowling, dean bell more recently Terry newton I could mention loads of others

Was the story about Ray mordt being wanted for virtually hammering someone to death in south Africa correct ?

Kelvin Skerrett

Super Kel. Just check out his highlights on youtube.

Ronnie Gibbs was always a favourite of mine. Read Paul Vautins autobiography and a funny story about him driving 3 other players to a match cross country, they got bored and started to flick his ears while he was driving, after a while he stated that if anyone did it again then he would stop the car and give a pasting to all 3 regardless of who did it. One of the players obliged and sure enough he pulled the car over ordered them out and smacked all 3 of his team mates.

Quentin Pongia was also a legendary hardman, you could tell when he signed with us his reputation was known amongst the players, nobody ever messed with him in his time at Wigan and when there was a fight it soon calmed once Q got anywhere near to it.

Brett Dallas, the hits he took and the way he'd run it up the middle, a joy to watch!

David Furner was a reputed hard nut. Certainly didn't mess about on the field

i always thought that Mick Cassidy was as tough as they come. Dont think i saw anyone ever get the better of him. Ian Robert hammered him with a monster hit in the Wigan v Aus game and Mick just jumped straight back up and played the ball. I could not believe that he just stood up as if nothing happened. You used to watch opposition forwards sucking it in when he was on the park because he would just beast them relentlessly.

Mean dean is an obvious one

Tallis, Paul Harrigan also

some may disagree, but in his pomp Stu Fielden knew how to put it about and i remember him leathering Jason Smith in the WCC for the Bulls. I also remember Barrie Mac coming a cropper after trying it on in one of there legendary scuffles. Brian Noble alluded to it in a post match interview saying somthing along the lines of "not mention anynames, but the master got shown up by the pupil today"

Furner and his "hard nuts" did their messing about off the field.

The fight between Gorden Tallis and Terry O'Connor in '97 was a beauty.