He's played a grand total of 7 first team games at centre, can you name even a single player who was the full package after that amount of time? I've just checked out the stats, our other first team centre, Darrell Goulding, played 100 games from '05 - '11 before he finally nailed down what looks to be a permanent first team spot in 2012. Now some people say he should be playing for England. I'm not saying Gelling should get another 93 games, but I am saying he's showing plenty of promise, if he keeps up his current form I'd give him the 4 shirt next year, then we can reassess after he's had a full season in 2014, which is also when his contract is up

Gelling looks like the type of player that will score a few but give plenty away too,I'm not convinced yet that he is going to be our starting despite the fact that he definitely has the potential

I think Gelling looks very sound defensively, far more than Thornley. Gelling's issue is keeping hold of the ball. But on the otherhand he also looks far more threatening than Thornley. A strong runner, seems more confident finding his way to the line, helps out the forwards coming out of our own half. Hes the leading contender by some margin for that no 4 jersey, problem is he isnt from Wigan so he is the one being made the scapegoat when in reality, with some nurturing and developing the rawness in his game we could have a world beater on our hands.

Gelling seems to be more athletic than Thornley but Iain is a more reliable player.
In big games we can't afford to turn over the ball Gelling and Hughes are doing at present. We got away with it v HKR but we wouldn't against a top side.
Thornley is a more complete centre than either of the other two, safer as well, Pat scores more tries alongside Thornley too.

Surely it is a good thing to have the two or even the three centre's playing for the two postion's.

We have competition it in the other positions.

I am sorry but that is nonsense. I have seen some Wigan lads get absolutely slated on these message boards, more so than players from outside the town. Ironically some of the worst for this were some of the posters that now want special treatment for Gelling. The biggest scapegoat I have ever seen on these boards was Darrell Goulding and he was hounded by some on here when he was still a teenager and went through a few seasons of being blamed for just about everything by some.

Too true, and like I have said before, one of the worse examples was the treatment of Keiron O'Loughlin, father of Sean in the eighties.

Wigan lads do get given more support when they are starting out though. Gelling is 22, I don't believe for a second that a 22 year old straight out of the academy would be getting the same amount of stick after 23 games (16 of which he was out of position)

As I said no they do not. Goulding got far more stick as a teenager and 20 year old than Gelling has ever got. Wigan lads often have to put up with all kinds of rubbish and get stick from people not just for Rugby reasons but because they werent liked by people from school, junior rugby, jealousy etc. I think that imports often get a lot more slack and the old they are being made a scapegoat because they are an import line is just an excuse trotted out in an attempt to defend them and give them more time.

We'll have to agree to disagree on that, Daz never got this kind of abuse from the stands as far as I recall. Breaking news by the way, Gelling's contract has been extended another year, source - Bilko

Thornley is 21 and from Wigan and he gets stick

Never heard Thornley get anywhere near the amount of stick that Gelling has recieved in his time here. He doesn't make the same amount of handling errors though.