from the starting 17 this year:

1. Mathers out - Phelps in. Stronger? Yes.
3. Gleeson in - Goulding to cover. Stronger? Yes.
6. Smith out - Tomkins in. Stronger? Yes.
11. Hock out - Mossop in. Stronger? No but Mossop gets 2 years experience developing into a better and better player, Hock comes back, Mossop goes to prop. Stronger in the long run? Yes.
12. Bailey out - Joel/Hansen in. Stronger? Yes. The only thing we're losing from Bailey if he does go is experience, Hansens just as good in Defence, if not better and Joels attack is awesome especially close to our line, he scores with ease outwide.

People need to stop gettin their knickers in a twist over everything, at the end of the day we are going in the right direction developing our young players in this way and i have every faith in Lenegan. Look at Leeds, they took a few years out to develop the likes of McGuire, Burrow, Sinfield, Diskin, Gibson, Hall and look where we are now. We can be there in a couple of years if we just be patient and take the good with the bad, we've got a good breed of young players making their way and Sam, Joel, Mossop, O'Loughlin, Ainscough, Goulding, Prescott, O'Carroll, Farrell will be the backbone of our team for the next decade guarranteed. They aint going anywhere with Lenegan in charge.

Im not a "staunch" critic. He has cocked up the Noble issue without doubt and with regards his recruitment, Im not impressed. Alot of other things are very good yes, but surely Mick Hogan has to take much of that credit.

Yes resigning Sam & Phelps are excellent moves, but SURELY with Hock & Bailey alone going we could afford a player like Tronc. A prop is a must and IL is failing to deliver and this "must be affordable/right" claptrap doesnt wash, do Saints put every player through these tests, if so IL is shopping at the wrong clubs or needs to rethink his ideas.

Super, but other clubs bring in experience and quality to suppliment that homegrown talent, and to do so they pay the going rate, something IL doesnt seem to want to do.

He's brought in Gleeson, a regular GB/England international and he payed the going rate.
We have Carmont, Richards, O'Loughlin Gleeson, Fielden, Riddell, Roberts, Coley virtually half of the 17 with bags of experience, some others like Leuluai, Prescott, Goulding, Hansen have their fair share of experience aswell despite being young.
Theres 6 friggin months till the new season yet, he's got time to sign people - he's just not rushing and signing someone for the sake of it, if Mo was in charge we probably would have signed some big aussie on Massive wages like Willie Mason straight away without going into fitness/injury/form/visa problems. And Sam Tomkins would probably be playing on the same contract he's on this year next year and end up getting snapped up by Huddersfield/Warrington/Saints because we cant afford to offer him what he's worth when it comes to contract time. Would you rather that happen?

Players like Tomkins, Mossop, Farrell, O'Loughlin, even Phelps are the key to our future success, we need to secure them lot first before anything else.

Once, what about key "project" signings like Smith & Mathers?



If we are counting on the likes of Goulding for experience, we are in trouble. We can count on Fielden for nowt. Carmont could well be on his way and half our fans cant stop slagging off Roberts!!! Yes, we do have experience, but that doesnt mean it is the right kind. Would you like any of the players mentioned to have the experience of someone like Wiki - the answer is yes.



He has basically said he wont be. It isnt for the sake of it, ill say it now, 2010 - No props, no pots! We cant sign anyone on massive wages because we have Fielden. Maurice did real bad with Aussies didnt he. Lam, Renouf, Trent, Pongia, Smith, Furner, Dallas?? But of course, IL is untouchable and Noble and seemingly Maurice are to blame for everything.



Clearly I wouldnt rather it happen, to even ask that is idiotic, but lets be clear, if Sam has took such a payrise that we cant afford a prop than IL has made a mess of his new deal, if it is structrued to rise with his development then fine.



Farrell hasnt even played first team yet, to include him in the first team "key" future is interesting. He could totally bottle first team rugby.

You know what, i cant even be bothered. I bet IL wishes he never bought us anymore with this WE WANT EVERYTHING NOW BECAUSE WE ARE WIGAN attitude from some of our fans, its pathetic.

Great post.

Hurrah, some common sense.

Well said Cruncher.

Any chance of making that a sticky at the top of the board?

The only thing I am slightly dubious of is the duty of care line that in my opinion may come back to bite us on the behind.

Obviously there has to be investigation into the fitness and suitability of a player but i do think that not making a move for Tronc or O'Meley may prove to be a mistake, only time will tell though i guess.

I agree. As I said, or at least intimated, one of the things I think we've handled badly has been our search for a new prop.

Time will tell on that.

I agree with most of what else you say in your post but the above is IMO a bit too simplistic in how it lambastes the previous administration.

I don't think anyone wants to go back to that style of leadership but IL's style isn't perfect either IMO. Mistakes have been made IMO over the way Higham was treated and how the coaching issue has been handled. I don't think the "we don't know what is going on behind the scenes" excuse is a good enough excuse.

As to Mo signing players we certainly did sign some players on big money but they were not expected to fail. If Fielden and DV had lived up to their billings there would be no complaints.

It is very easy to point to players like these to take pot shots at the previous administration but do you honestly think they signed them because they thought they would play like they did? Hindsight is a wonderful thing because it gives you 20:20 vision.

As AJ pointed out Mo signed plenty of other overseas players who were great players.

I would go further and say when we got done on the salary cap for renegotiating the contracts to allow us to sign Fielden Mo and the club was hard done by. Doing what he did with the contracts was and is allowed in the NRL so why the RFL decided to act differently is the interesting question. IMO the reason we got done on a subjective view of this not being in the spirit of the cap was the fuss and the press stirred up by certain other clubs. Typical RFL who make it up as they go along. Had common sense prevailed it would have been a master stroke of administration of getting in a prop who went long way to help save us from relegation while sticking within the salary cap. As it is even Wigan fans will use this to have a go at him because it is convenient.

I am happy to believe for now that IL is running the club in a way he considers in its best interests but whether people want to admit it or not, so did Mo.

It is going to be interesting to see how things progress over the next few years but when IL says we won't be signing anyone we are basically going into next season with the same side that lost 11 games this. Also when he says we will only sign world class overseas players the season after signing two distinctly average overseas players , then signs none for 2010 is it any wonder there is some skepticism developing? Actions speak louder than words and at the moment we are a bit short on the action.

There may be good reasons in the short term not to sign these world class players and stick with what we have got (though he did say 2010 was the year he would be free to act just after he arrived) but this has got to be a short term thing because good though our youth system is I doubt it is capable of producing enough top class players to make Wigan a success on its own.

Dave