Green was fantastic as was Lockers and Micky Mac and Richards had his best game for a while on a big night for him but the most pleasing performance came from two young forwards IMO. I thought Crosby and Burke were exceptional against a big and experienced Catalan pack. They look the real deal at the moment and thats great to see.

Great night.

Given what's gone on in the last couple of weeks that's the 1 pub I'd rather drive back to Chester than go in!

Leon was gaining on him untill the 30 yard line, Paddy started to pull away after that. What made it even better was his TL kick after his try.

its great that we have players coming back to give the lads a break, but i cant understand how you have such a downer on Eric when he hasnt even played yet (especially given how poor preccy was when he did turn out, and how decent a 2012 eric had).
we may have a good young pack, but the game we lost (hudds) was down to us not being able to compete with the size of their pack over a full 80 mins (in particular crabtree). a second row of faz and tuson may be good at backing up, but it lacks grunt and power. having H and Eric back is going to be key to bolstering that part of our game (esp as we are also missing the physical impact of Gaz - even if we are not missing his indiscipline).
the kids are doing well now, but as has oft been said, we need everyone fresh for sept. we also dont know how the inexperienced players will do under the high intensity of play-offs, so old heads will be important to have around. it will also give us experience and size if we want to rest lockers and use Lloyd/Faz/Tuson to cover loose.

I have to say, well done SW for being able to spot the potential and integrate them into team.
Next step is to do the same for the backs (get Murphy his mojo back, and get some game time for the likes of manfedi, williams and hampshire).

Because based on his performances for Wigan since he has been here he is IMO downright average at best.



There is nothing wrong with your logic about wanting to rest players, needing some size etc but for me Lauaki simply isn't the answer. When he gets tackled it's all arms flailing about and very showy but for such a big man he has very little impact when he runs it in. I reckon Dudson for example is already a much better player. If you reckon we need to add some size to the front row then we need to bring in a Pongia type player not rely on Lauaki.

As to the back row there is no doubt we will be better off with Hansen back so I hope I didn't give the impression I was saying otherwise. We will also be better off again when Goulding returns. So IMO the players to come back who will improve the side are Mossop, Hansen and Goulding. I have always liked Prescott as a player but am just concerned he will come back and be out again injured.

its always interesting to see how people view a players performance in a season (and there is no correct answer). i havent analysed these in much detail, but from 2012, here is the raw data for the forwards.
eric had a pretty decent year. good tackling, decent yards/carry and very few errors. I know that stats dont tell the whole story, but i think you are doing eric a dis-favour (eg just compare his stats with HH)

TK - MI - % - C - M - Av - E - P - RC - YC
Ben Flower 317 - 17 - 95% - 129 - 879 - 6.8 - 5 - 4 - 0 - 0
Chris Tuson 346 - 15 - 96% - 117 - 746 - 6.4 - 5 - 4 - 1 - 0
Eric Lauaki 330 - 14 - 96% - 229 - 1619 - 7.1 - 6 - 12 - 0 - 0
Gareth Hock 427 - 36 - 92% - 331 - 2238 - 6.8 - 32 - 24 - 1 - 0
Gil Dudson 141 - 2 - 99% - 66 - 494 - 7.5 - 0 - 3 - 0 - 1
H Hansen 584 - 24 - 96% - 260 - 1658 - 6.4 - 10 - 9 - 0 - 0
Jeff Lima 501 - 14 - 97% - 378 - 2910 - 7.7 - 15 - 10 - 0 - 0
Lee Mossop 433 - 13 - 97% - 248 - 1958 - 7.9 - 5 - 14 - 0 - 0
Liam Farrell 516 - 9 - 98% - 271 - 1908 - 7.0 - 5 12 - 0 - 0
Mike McIlorum 746 - 48 - 94% - 483 - 2210 - 4.6 - 13 - 28 - 2 - 0
Paul Prescott 139 - 3 - 98% - 92 - 708 - 7.7 - 6 - 2 - 0 - 0
Lockers 581 - 32 - 94% - 364 - 1894 - 5.2 - 17 - 18 - 0 - 0

Watching the highlights on Wigan TV, Bentham says "Forward" after Lockers passes to Tuson for his try, then says "OK" when he scores

ahhh, so bentmam is a pie at heart.
the words he obviously had to stop himself from continuing with were " ... to the try line young man"

to be fair. he did a decent job last night. first time in ages we've had a ref who actually called forward passes and dealt with trouble when it happened. he let the players decide the match, which is always good.

If the stats of Lauaki and H are comparable then it only goes to show, as you say, stats [idefinitely don't [/itell the whole story.

I thought he was inconsistent with policing the high shots. We got pinged for two pretty innocuous ones and I felt he let at least two blatant ones go the other way. IIRC there were also a couple of obvious shoulder charges from Les Cats as well which are now illegal of course. Les Cats were also offside by yards numerous times.

I am all for less penalties for minor transgressions but I don't think that should translate to being inconsistent.

What was Elima binned for? Was that a shoulder charge?

I thought it was Pelissier who was the offender and Elima was binned for dissent (having been warned only minutes earlier).