In fairness Hardaker until what 6 months before his contract ran out barely put a foot wrong did he, quite why he couldn't sit on his contract, say nowt and leave wigan with the fans best wishes ringing in his ears was one of life's great mysteries to me.

As for Hastings hes an odd one for sure, loves the big fish,small pond it seems to me and woe betide anyone getting in his way, not good in a team sport

He was constantly in bother….he always had been, always will be.

Lad can’t stay away from the pub and bother follows him.

It makes you appreciate the characters we now have at the club. I can’t think of a single player who worries you that they’ll go off the rails or bring trouble. It doesn’t mean it can’t happen but it would at least now be a surprise.

Agreed we have good characters but i have it on decent authority that Thompson is struggling to settle back in. I don't know whether that is just at Wigan or back in England but hopefully just teething problems. I can't name my source but i have been pretty solid in the past. He looks pretty decent out there on the pitch though so if there is more to be unlocked hopefully it will come.

It’s certainly not showing on the field or in interviews but it’s probably not a massive surprise, the weather has been grim for months now and I’m sick of it, if you’ve been in Oz for years it’s likely amplified and being a Saints fan at Wigan that probably feels strange.

We've had the same drizzly cold weather almost every day since October. Although it was quite nice this afternoon for a couple of hours.

Not that he’s going to say any different but in an interview on Wigan TV today Thompson said he’s loving it here.


I think we could all do with some Aussie sun at the minute. If he is struggling a bit, hopefully the brighter days we’ll cheer him up (if we get any).

I must admit it felt like spring this afternoon

Luke’s a tough bunny he’ll be reet. He was gutted that he didn’t play in the WCC.

Souths are after George Delaney from Saints and Tom Amone from Leigh.


Dupree and Holroyd have also been mentioned as target.

Hope we can keep Tyler.

I was just about to post the same. Amone would be the most realistic with him being out of contract. Holroyd I can't see because of the injury problems. I think with somebody like Dupree, a lot would depend on if he wants it or not and if they were prepared to pay up for him. I'll be honest, I don't think he's ready for that step yet. I rate him and what he brings but he just needs to start stamping his authority on the biggest games before thinking of NRL moves. It'll come no doubt about it but he's still quite an inexperienced top level player because of his time out of Superleague.

I wonder if the negotiator they've sent over is another of these NRL pillocks whose first approach will be: "Sending your best guys to us is such an honour that we were hoping you wouldn't even contemplate asking for transfer fees."

You'd like to think the club would put a line in the sand at this point with NRL interest in contracted players. It's hard enough trying to keep hold of players who are out of contract. Hopefully having a billionaire as an owner makes transfer fees easier to resist.

Having said all that we don't know how many of our players are only signing long contracts if there is an NRL clause in place.

i'm taking it with a rather large pinch of salt (more like an industrial grit spreader) given its come from serious about league. They've nowt better to write about, so just picked 4 random names to make an article

They've just ripped it from another site (surprise surprise). It originally comes from an Australian journalist for the Daily Telegraph. There is no way that guy is in England just to bring a pen for Lewis Dodd to sign a contract, so I'm sure he'll be talking to other players but I do think they may have thrown some random names around.