Looking at our squad for the Wakefield game and how lightweight we are up front with current injuries, it’s absolutely baffling how we haven’t got any more forwards in yet as mentioned the other day in the rumours thread. We’ve had a good run of easier fixtures to get ourselves into the top 5. Got beat by the better team last week, but surely we can’t be letting our league position slip by losing on Thursday because we can’t compete in the middle (like what happened at their place)

We're pretty fortunate that on Thursday they're short of Fafita and Kopzcak. Looking at their squad they've got England, Hurst and George King as their props and then some power in the back row (or probably filling in the front row) via Pauli Pauli and Tanginoa but it could be far worse. We need big performances from the senior forwards like Farrell, Clubb, Powell and Isa and if we can get that then our backline should hopefully have too much for them. We certainly need to move the ball around with more accuracy then we managed on Friday.

Because our biggest problem at the moment as I have alluded to since prior to the start of the season is getting enough minutes out of our senior forwards.

That's been magnified by losing tatuai and Hamlin but with the reduced interchange they were all going to need to play more note less minutes.

People with agendas have picked scapegoats this season as always withbolaywrs such as sarginson, William's Isa and Powell taking most of the flak and Lockers seems to get it from quite a lot due to his age.

Yet Lockers minutes have been pretty good this year along with appearances but he still gets picked out.

We have Clubb (in particular) Flower and now Greenwood (which I'm prepared to give time to as 5/6 knocks/injuries over the last 12/14 weeks isn't necessarily something that will go on forever but is a worrying trend) contributing very little in terms of minutes and appearances and am amazed he gets away in general with relatively very little criticism IMO.

We do have quite a lot of issues but in terms of prioritising them our front row issue is 10xtimes larger than any other IMO and I get frustrated at criticism of the players like Sarge/Williams/Powell/Isa who all play 90% of games and 70/80mins every week with the best effort of all the players yet get 90% of the criticism from the experts, whilst others get away relatively lightly.

The decision to give Clubb 2 more years is something I am dtill having sleepless nights about and its causing me severe neck pain as I'm shaking my head in disbelief that much.

If it's ok with you when I see players being singled out who have done nothing but their best and been brilliant for this club being pointed out for their supposed lack of games or minutes forgive my tiny indulgence in pointing out that 2 or 3 of our squad need to comtribute a lot more and we need to worry about that without worrying about Lockers.

Spot on, take Isa for example, not the most skilful or biggest but never ever seems to be injured and always gives 100% whilst playing 80 minutes 90% of the time

Put a list up of the players criticised the most over the last 18 months or so and I'd take a small bet that Isa/Powell/Sarge/Williams would be getting 75% plus of the stick (And another favourite for stick was Sutton).

These guys are IMO contributing a larger share of the positive contributions to the club and its results yet get most of the stick.
I've said for a long time that these guys should be acknowledged as part of the answer and not part of the problem.
I find it unreal that were happy that Sarge/William's and previously Sutton are leaving and we seem to want to get shut of the Powells and Isa's of this world yet as I say IMO the largest part of our problem can be isolated in 1 small area of the team.

PS
I reckon isa's played 22 games ish this season and apart from 10mins at wire in the cup and the last minute at Huddersfield hes player pretty much every minute of our games so far.
I accept everyone fit he may not get in, but hes a perfect squad member and his value for money must be staggering compared to others who get more praise and accolades.

I like Isa for his contribution, he had a poor overall game last week at Saints, but in general he is a 7 or 8 out 10 every week, the sort of player every team needs.
Then we have the Escare love in, probably one of the most over rated least effective players I have seen at Wigan in the last ten years.

Probably the worst game I’ve seen him have for us last week but he’s usually very consistent. The thing with Isa is that he was signed as a squad player but because he’s so durable and others drop like flys around him, he’s ending up starting and being flogged to death year in year out. The guy just gets on with it and never lets us down.

This sums up how far we've fallen and how low our expectations are. We are at home to Wakefield, not facing the NRL champions in their own back yard for the WCC.

If it's ok with you answer my question what has SOL got to with Clubb? By using Clubb you are simply deflecting the question of how many minutes SOL plays during the course of the season and the clubs management of the salary cap.

SOL has been one of my all time favourite players so I have no agenda re SOL but I can understand why some question his contribution over the entire season. I suspect cash wise he may be our highest paid player, he is our captain and to a large extent he still is our go to player. For those 3 reasons I suspect is why people question SOLminutes and why they get frustrated when he is off injured on a regular basis or cannot play the full 80.

Personally I was glad when we resigned him for this season however, age is against him and for me there is a definite growing of deminishing returns as he gets older and his all round contribution is nowhere that of a few years ago. Having said that I dread to think what this would have been like if SOL hadn't been here this season even if his performances compared to earlier years are of significantly lower quality.

As I say I think with SOL it is more frustration than anything else that generates the questions from posters as to his worth re the number of minutes he plays over the season.

The problem we have as I see it is how do we replace SOL for the same level of salary cap expenditure which is compounded by in my opinion poor use of the cap elsewhere and that is entirely the fault off IL and KR not the players who have been given contracts that appear to be incredulous to most supporters e.g. Escare, Clubb

Equally
I could have asked what has SOL minutes played got to do with this thread?
I could have asked what has SOL games played got to do with this thread?

I am not deflecting SOL's contribution onto Tony Clubb
I am pointing out to people questioning SOL ( Why not ask the OP of the remark about SOL why he though he needed to bring that up? Why not question Greenwood, Clubb's minutes or anything else?) that his contribution along with ISA/Williams/Sarge/Powell is far more than others who avoid criticism. And went on to explain how 4 or 5 of the most criticised players at the club actually contribute the most.

Anyway, I'll leave BFUT alone from now on but I only wish other players had a nice song about their name, as that's the only positive I can see from his current contributions whilst others who play far more games and triple the minutes get criticised.

PS

If I was handing out contracts SOL would have been far further up the queue for a 2yr deal than Clubb

Maybe it's just me but I'm an Evolution not Revolution type person in these situations and as I have said previously 75% of our issue IMO comes from 10/15% of our team primarily in one area - I'd concentrate on that first of all and the tinkering can be done later.

Sorry Jukes you've lost me BFUT?
Wouldn't disagree with your final paragraph at all.

At the end of the day it's all about opinions. One of the guys who I go to the match with criticises Gildart and Williams every game irrespective of their performance. I just don't take the guy on which can be hard at times but I'm never going to change his mind to I've stopped trying.

I agree with you 100% re we have bigger problems that need resolving pdq and I will be mortified if we don't bring in at least one more experienced prop.

Ha Ha - I knew I'd get a Bite with BFUT
Round about the Catalans/Barcelona debacle when his contribution was terrible at the end of the game he came over to the Wigan fans, took off the 400mtrs of bandages he was wearing and slammed them down on the ground and applauded the Wigan fans like he'd just give us 80 minutes of Gladiatorial herculean effort! The Wigan fans were singing their Tony Clubb song and my mate (You know who you are) called him Big Fat Useless T*** which you can either input an expletive or Tony! I'll leave that to others.

I didn't go to Saints as was in Cyprus (First Wigan Saints match I've missed since 1998 when my plane was delayed for 18hrs coming back from Mexico returning from my Honeymoon ) but was listening on the Tarmac waiting to fly back and I heard that Williams and Isa didn't have great games, Sarge gave a few penalties away etc. etc. and couldn't help but think people would start having a go at them again.
Top line is in a squad we need 5/6 props at any one time and currently we have 4 - Clubb/Flower/Naverette and a largely untested Joe Bullock (Given that we are without TT & Hamlin)
The 2/3 youngsters shouldn't be considered as part of the 5/6 and what we have is Clubb & Flower not contributing largely through injuries but at least when Flower does play he plays large mins and Clubb does neither.
Add to that Naverette is very middle of the road the whole problem stems from this and this is the CRUX of what needs resolving.
Give me 2 more front line props (And I'm not even talking Top international Quality, Decent SL Lads who will play 27 plus games and do 50mins each week will do me) and I am more than convinced that our back row/Bench will feel the benefit of the reduced workload, our youngsters wouldn't be under as much pressure and our Backs, which I still consider to be amongst the best in the league, could play off the back of this

We can carry Clubb with lack of games & Mins, We can carry Flower through injury periods, We can carry Naverette's averageness at times , We can be patient with Bullock & Partington - We can't just do it with all of them as we are Very exposed.

I don't think Clubby will like being called a Twit

We’ve not invested properly in the front row for a while now. We seem to have a policy of having 6 or so options but none are top class and most were signed as cheap project options. The team is crying out for a prop leader, a go to player to take games by the scruff of the neck and show the others the way. Things weren’t great at the start of this year and then we lost two of those already pretty average options and seem unable to replace them (other clubs seem to ship lads in and out at the drop of a hat).

I can’t say the options being linked (or already signed in the case of Clark) such as Green or Jensen fill you with confidence that they’ll be that main man we need. We need to stop signing 3rd/4th/5th choice props and go and get a 1st choice for me.

I see some of the metres made by NRL props (and forgetting Taumalolo, and accepting he's just a freak), and I weep. Surely there enough of those guys out there for Wigan to be able to get hold of one?