I thought Riddell had a great game yesterday, made good metres from runs from dummy half, put himself out in defence as well.

If Leuleui was moved to hooker who would play at scrum-half for you?

Interesting that IL sees Leuleui as a hooker long term. What exactly are IL's credentials in relation to player development. I thought he use to put on shows and run pubs didn't realise he was an expert RL coach.

You do need a better halfback to partner Tomkins, if you look at potential halfback pairings for next year then Wigan are well down the pecking order.

dont worry wire sign good hookers and play at 7 we do it all time

If Tommy is to stay at the club, it has to be at 9 for me.

He spent much of his time yesterday at 9 and was ineffective.

Personally i think he has been playing well and complementing ST quite nicely of late. I am happy yo go into next year with him at 7, especially when you consider we need to invest up front, although that seems unlikely to happen if IFL is to be believed.

Wigan were already 3 tries down when Riddell left the field.

If Wigan did invest in a new 7 (although it would now seem unlikely) We would have 3 players all gunning for the 9 shirt. This is, in my opinion, one of the reasons why IL is keeping Tommy at 7. Here he can keep Tommy, McC and Piggy all in the team. For me this is wrong as one of the major areas for concern in attack is our lack of creativity from our 7.


Riddell has come on since the first half of the season, but lets face it, he couldn't have gotten much worst. Even now as a more settled 9 he's still not as good as a handful of 9's in SL. Was he worth bringing from the other side of the world? Nope.

Last son of wigan, that is the best post I have seen from you and I am glad you make the point without saying he is crap or anything, it is a tricky situation. The solution is to play him at hooker but then who do we drop?

That is were the problem lies for me. Out of our current squad, Tommy is the best option to play 7 if Sam is played at 6. With this in mine in accomidates both McC and Riddell to cover the 9 spot interchanging throughout the game, this is why we have Tommy as a 7.
Regardless of the obvious logic of the team selection, the question remains, is Tommy good enough as a 7? In my opinion, no he isn't (As I discussed in the orginal post).

This then leaves the coach or IL with the tricky situation of what to do to improve the team, if a new 7 is brought in, the team could improve but it means dropping 1 of 3 (Tommy/Riddell/McC) all offer different positives, Experience with Riddell, young postives with McC, and potentially the best 9 we have in Tommy. This is were true coaching comes into the team, making the decision who to drop.

It's easy to say we shouldn't have signed Riddell, but thats a pointless point as he is now with the club.

For me, this area needs to be addressed if we are to succeed as a winning team.

I totally agree. In broken field and against a tired defence Tommy is awesome. However, running set plays and kicking he is well down the table in terms of Super League scrum halves. Cut Riddell and bring in a stand-off to let Sam play 7 with Tommy and Micky Mc as hookers.

In reality Riddell is a Wigan player on a contract, can't just end his contract. If he was to be dropped moving Tommy to 9 we then would have to accomadate a new 7 within our CAP, something that IL has stated he'll not be doing.
I'm all for giving promising young Wigan players new contracts developing a more well balanced squad, but the right signing is needed to improve the team.

I fail to see postive improvement for next season with Tommy at 7. At times we look great but I believe we just don't that little bit extra at 7 we'll need to become champs.

Yeah fair enough, just being hypothetical. I'm just tired of Piggy doing jaff all and us not having a proper kicking game.

I never think any player needs longer than a 1 year deal, keeps them keen if nothing else. I know from an admin point of view it'd be a pain, but it'd keep the players keen.

I agree, in theory that would be better, but thats another issue. Many on here seem to like Riddell, in my opinion he has improved but he's still not a top 9, and defo not worth shipping over all the way from Aus.
In my opinion he's behind

Moore
Cunningham
Drew
Clarke
Diskin
Roby
Glen M

to name a few. I personally don't blame IL, at the time the Tommy at 9 concept was none heard of (pre WC) and Higham wasn't cutting it, so it made sense to bring in a 9.

could it be that the problem with tommy at the moment is that the constant switching between positions is reducing his performance at both? maybe he would go better if we actually played him in one position only during a game?

mind you that means noble might have to drop a chosen one and play one of the reserves