Farrell's a machine, but sometimes you can see he's going to get penalised for lying on before the ref blows. Needs to get up a fraction earlier. All the forwards did well tbf. Bateman looks like he's going to be a good'un. Flower did some excellent stuff too.

nonsense

Farrell for me has been immense for the last few seasons, and I couldn't be happier about it as my old man always said he was too light and wouldn't make it, to which I argued, height has no issue when you can break the line as often and have a great leg drive and defence as good as his. It's nice to get one up on the old boy for once

But as other have said he has started laying on noticeably longer recently, even when the ref doesn't blow for it, I find myself shouting "get off him!!" after 25% of tackles he makes. Hope he sorts it out as he is consistently one of best performers and would be a shame to blot that with constant spoiling. Perhaps as said above, we rely on him too much and he does far too many minutes?

...would also like to point out, he isn't nearly as slow as getting out the play the ball area as Clubb, that dude just seems cumbersome to me.

Farrell really is a machine and obviously really puts the effort in in training. He does have a problem giving away stupid penalties but no player is perfect and with the sheer amount of work that he does he is always going to give away more than most.

I agree about Faz..tackles for fun, and thats prob why hes sometimes a bit slow getting away from the tackle..hes close to exhaustion and needs a breather imo. I think we might get even more from him if we gave him a 5 minute rest mid second half

When Wire scored the breakaway try Faz and I think Green got back and across to chase him and keep him out wide, thus making the kick difficult. Faz's effort was rewarded when Ratchford missed.

Perhaps the people who think he should be spelled should think again. He is the fittest player at the club, and this one instance illustrates it perfectly.

Reading between the lines of Rads' final blog after the WCC, I think the club have realised they have got their recruitment slightly wrong this year, and it's left us very light in the SR. I presume the original intention was to use Clubb there, but it is now pretty obvious that he is better utilised straight up the middle than outwide, same with Pettybourne and Flower. I'm not sure what the deal is with Hopkins, and even if he does break in to the first team where SW intends to play him.

Our recruitment in this off-season has left us oversubscribed with props and far too short with SRs. Farrell is top quality, Bateman is looking a top signing but is probably playing far more than the club originally wanted him to and there are still massive question marks over Hughes, after that we are left with youngsters waiting for their debuts.

I'm wondering whether or not they'll keep Flower in the back row when Lockers returns. He's been getting through loads of tackles this season so could really shore up that side. Alternatively, if it's felt he's no longer mobile enough to play second row he could defend at loose with Lockers defending at second row. It looks fairly clear to me that neither Hughes nor Clubb fit the bill

i don't think this thread is in any way intended to criticise his talents, we are simply airing our opinions on the amount of needless penalties he seems to giving away of late and some have therefore alluded to a potential fitness issue which is understandable.

Mark Bitcom is certainly earning his money, as we now have props filling in at second row and he is having to get them fitter and faster in a short time scale. As well as bulking up the younger lads to play in there.

Probably one of the most important men at Wigan at the present time, and someone we desperately need to keep at the club.

We are light in the 2nd row but v Wire the coaches did seem to have found one way of preventing them doing to much "heavy lifting"
There were only a couple of minutes gone when Burgess was given the ball, he went around Monaghan and was tackled by Ratchford. He'd gone from our 30 approx to their 20 mtr line. That's a lot of yards forward our pack had not had to make. 2nd time Joe got the ball Faz scored.
That move was repeated 3 or 4 times in the 2nd half with Joe B making 30 to 40 mtrs a run. Hence his almost 200 mtrs in the game.
Faz and Bateman did make big meters but I did think the use of Joe B was well planned. Also bearing in mind Wire's starting 6 forwards were an average of 8 years a man older than the Wigan starting 6.

I think it was said on another thread, but Gelling must be worth a shot in the second row, big, pretty quick and he's shown he's got a decent off-load when he's played at centre. Useful player to have on the subs bench.

Can't see why he isn't getting a shot there to be honest. He's NOT going to make it as a winger, has too much competition at centre to be able to hold down a place. He makes good yards in the tackle and has a great offload. Plus if we get an injury in the backs during a game he can cover there. I only see him making it at Wigan if he plays second row but for some reason we are persisting with players who are under performing I this position rather than playing him.