Fair enough to the above then.

The other time is now.

Certainly not on my part. I thought I had been constructive in my comments. What parts of my post do you disagree with?

Certainly. Matt Orford, Richie Myler and Sean Long are just a few examples of new halfbacks at struggling clubs.

Saints and Leeds have always had someone to lead the around the park. Keiron Cunningham has done it for Saints & Kevin Sinfield has done it for Leeds. I hope Sam Tomkins can do the same for us, but he is very young & still fairly inexperienced compared to some of the halfbacks in this league. That's why the Paul Deacon signing is an excellent one - for his experience and coaching alone.



Riddell would definitely be better if he was fit. Let's not forget this guy has played state of origin before. There is an excellent player in Riddell and it irritates me we haven't see this from him. Do I see him as a poor signing? So far yes. I would have liked to have moved Leuluai to hooker with McIlorum and looked to an experienced halfback to partner Sam Tomkins - Greg Bird? But hindsight is a wonderful thing I guess. Riddell is one of the players Shaun Wane must have been referring to when he has said he wants to see a '20%' improvement in players & Riddell's name is the only one Mike MaGuire has mentioned in regards to fitness which suggests to me he is very frustrated he is away and is eager for him to return to start work immediantly.

Sam can certainly do the same for us long term but atm I really want him to develop his game more and become a better player and begin to boss the team around when its needed.

Riddell can be awesome if he gets fit but I don't see him being an 80min hooker and Cam Smith style. Every part of his game other than his strength (weight) is behind Cam Smith.
Yes we can cover over it with "hopefully he will come good" "his stats show up better than highams" but at the end of the day....

6 Tomkins
7 Orford, Bird.... someone like that

9McIlorum

14 Leuluai

maybe a new prop.

Looks alot better than what we have right now.

I am still really annoyed that in 2 years under Noble, he never noticed Leuluai was a better hooker than half-back. Many problems have stemmed from this one thing.

Will Riddell really look awesome playing his old game though, from what I saw of him and a classic example is on youtube, alot of his good stuff was on the back of QPTB but we don't get these in super league anymore.

Roby
Pryce
The rest of the QPTB merchants...
..have been poor all year really.

IMO the only way for Riddell to truely fit in is for him to get fit, earn his place over the others and then organise our pack and play simple rugby with good distribution and develop his kicking game, he does many stupid plays and sometimes tries to hard.

At this current moment in time though, he is a waste of money, a waste of a quota spot and a massive dissapointment looking at the whole picture. Mark Riddell is an example of a player who is stealing a living.

Before I get stick off anyone, this is a very one sided post, I could post good stuff about him if I really wanted

Leave the guy on the bench as a short term impact player until.
A: He proves he deserves a starting spot
B: His fitness & commitment improve A LOT !

I've not quoted your post

Hey, hey, hey. Let's not let facts get in the way of a good pre-season lynching.

Perhaps we fans should now lay off the players - even the usual suspects - and see how they respond to what is in effect a completely new regime at Wigan.

There may have been all kinds of reasons why the likes of Riddell, Roberts, Pryce, Feka etc underperformed for Brian Noble.

We should wait and see if they continue to underperform for Mike Maguire. If they do, then we'll know there's a problem. Until then, a clean slate for everyone is surely a good idea.

Even Pryce ?????

(j/k )

Last season he wasnt good enough, but still an improvement on what we had. I think the biggest reason he gets so much stick is because we already have a hooker in the team who most prefer in that position in Leuluai, same with Roberts i think he gets most of his stick because most people would prefer to see Ainscough but it doesnt make them bad players.

Maybe in 2010 Piggy will be more settled in, a new start in married life and having his best mate in the country (glen hall) wont do him any harm.
Its a new start for all players and I think they all deserve a 2nd chance next year, for me Nobles style of coaching wasnt right for the team, we werent big enough and our backs have been wasting their talent for a couple of years. I think we will see massive improvement in most players next year.