I had some serious doubts but I never really thought he wouldn’t come.

I made a point somewhere in these 24 pages that I started to not see the point in signing him as we all know as well as him and the club that he will be off for 2021. I don’t really get the “train Smith up” mantra either and whilst I’m happy Smith will get an extra years development part of me queries whether we would have been better off just going with Smith and French at HB and putting the money invested into JH elsewhere like hooker.

If Powell carries on where he left off last year we’re fine at hooker, we’ll have Powell and Tommy rotating which is a good pair and we’ve got Borough and Roden coming through

Don't agree on Powell. If he can show the form he showed 3/4 of the way through, he will be fine. But he faded at the end of the season and offered no threat going forward.

One would hope/assume that training alongside Hastings at a time when he's getting some SL gametime might improve Smith. We also give ourselves the opportunity to take him out of the firing line if he's struggling/takes a knock/we're in a big game. As I wrote earlier, French and Smith have about 3 SL games in the halves between them; starting with one of them in the halves is a risk, never mind going into the season with both of them there as first choice.

Really don’t rate Powell in the slightest...he wouldn’t get a big minutes gig in any other sl side other than us. (If Huddersfield replace leeming)

Me neither and to think many want him as our next captain

I’m hot and cold on Powell. Sometimes he’s fantastic and others he’s bang average with bang average becoming the norm. Equally I worry about Tommy at hooker, I think his day has been and gone, which jointly is why I’m not over joyed at our hookers for 2020 and think we probably could have got away with spending money there.

Grimmy brought up earlier about the risk of French & Smith as starting halves and it is a risk. Don’t get me wrong as much as I don’t see the point in Hastings for a season, I’m also glad Smith gets another season to develop for a starting HB SL position. It will only do him good going forward certainly but if it came to it and we hadn’t have signed Hastings or, as The S*n rumour suggested and he didn’t come, I think we’d have been alright.

At least it gave us something interesting to talk about in the off season

On to the next rumour!

George Burgess offered a lifeline at Souths?

Adam Blair has been training with Wigan and it’s a done deal

Powell will be an interesting case this year. He definitely picked up under Lam last year regards his running game and that was always peoples stick to beat him with. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that we haven’t had a hooker who ran the ball since before Michael Maguire and then suddenly one who didn’t in Powell started to do so under a different style of coach to the last two. If you look at Powell’s stats he’s been fine in regards to setting up try’s from dummy half, racking up more assists than Houghton, Leeming and the great James Roby in each of the last two seasons. He’s a defensive machine also and has a tidy kicking game out of dummy half.

In short he’s underrated for my money and in a more attacking team this year, with what should hopefully be much better go forward, I think he can win a few people round.

I'd say he picked up for a brief period, around 4 games, around 2/3 of the way through the season. Before and after he was the same old.

I absolutely agree.

I think without doubt he was asked to play a certain way under our previous coach to fit a system.

Lam has somewhat allowed him more freedom and he looks to be much more comfortable with that.

His delivery looks better, his kicking is useful and whilst he doesn’t have that dynamic explosive pace his decision making of when to scoot has added to our options in attack.

His defence and commitment is also very good.

I think it’s also fair to say that his best performances have arguably come for England Knights prior to this year where he also seemed to be allowed more freedom.

It’s also easy to forget that he wasn’t really developed as a 9 throughout his junior career and to a certain extent is still relatively new to the role given his age and experience.

I was far from a fan of his however I think he has been one of the players to really benefit from a change in coach and look forward to seeing him kick on again next year.

So now Gary Carter (Sun journalist) puts together an article saying Jackson is actually coming to Wigan using quotes from an interview with Phil Wilkinson without giving Phil credit. A+ plus journalist that one.