burgess owned joel M from the very first play which is one, frightening for his age in comparison to experience and game know-how and two, even more significant considering joel has been one of the best wingers in the SL for some time now. and you can't put that down to a poor overall wire performance, George had an answer for everything JM attempted.

have been salivating about john B since his signing and he's proving to be one of our best signings of recent years already, alongside the currently ever present scott taylor who again scares the hell out of me considering his age.

Very impressed with Burgess last night. You often get young quick wingers capable of scoring, but he seemed to have a lot more to his game. Seemed to perform in every aspect of his game. Seems to have the intelligence of a veteran.

I'm sure he'll have a successful career in the NRL or union.

Both look absolutely tremendous prospects. Love the look of bateman (and did whilst at the bulls, glad he got rid of that sh+tty haircut though!!) He fits the overaggresive chav tag perfectly as a wigan player

There's been a lot of people bagging that game (and it wasn't the best) but for me that was the real Wigan showing up. Merciless in defence and out-wanting the opposition.

good performance - massively more dominant than the scoreline suggested.

Got to give Flower a mention too. Thought he was outstanding. He made about 3 cracking last-ditch tackles around the 70th-75th min mark when Wire were piling on the pressure. Never took a step backwards in attack either...

I'm not 100% sure Burgess needs a rest. Being a winger is arguably the easiest position to start off your career at. He's a young athletic lad so I don't think there are any issues there. He's just got to be managed correctly when he eventually has a bad game. It's going to happen at one point this season and when it does Wane has to ensure his confidence isnt smashed.

Bateman on the other hand needs a different approach. It stands to reason that if we keep playing him week in week out then it's simply a case of not if but when he'll get injured. Let's not forget he's a player who has been badly let down by his former employers and by the statments made when we signed him Wigan know they need to tread carefully.

The only issue with Bateman is there's not a huge list of talented guys behind him. Its another issue that would have been easily avoided had we not let HH leave.

HH has gone!!!! Why did no one mention this!!??!!

I think Shaun being left with no other option than to play Bateman. I think somebody needs to have a word with Jack Hughes or he needs a mentor, this is truly his big opportunity to nail down a first team spot and lack of concentration is stopping him doing it. He has clearly shown enough ability to do it but he needs to become consistent.
Still would like to see gelling get a run of 3 games at 2nd row, when he has a good game he gets dropped the following week.

Not something I'd like to see, potential to be a great player, but his opinions and beliefs leave a little to be desired.

Hughes has been the biggest disappointment of the season so far for me especially these past two weeks. As you say this was his time, his big chance to finally nail down a second row spot and he's been borderline woeful IMO. He has a lot of natural ability but concentration is definitely an issue as is a bit of complacency IMO. He seems to just drift through games at points and looks happy to enjoy the good times without really putting the hard graft in that sits behind that success.

I really rate him when his head is right but he strikes me as a lad that may at some point need to leave Wigan to wake him up and make him realise he should have put more in to it all.

I'm going purely off his on field game sense, attitude and ability to lead by example. His off the field beliefs are something I heard a rumour about during his Bradford days but I'd like to think he was being young and daft and will grow up and mature.

I do believe a captain needs to be an all round ambassador for the club like Lockers is so I take your point.

Everyone is young once, and, as you say, let's hope he's matured.

Exactly my thoughts. That's why I believe we should be looking at using Flower in the second row now that Clubb has moved to front row.

The question on here should be - does Phil Clarke have any more nephews like budgie?