If the disciplinary committee are consistent Wardle will get a £250 fine.

Team picks itself if that is the case with the exception of the halves if both Field (his is now surely our first choice 6) and Cust are not fit.

If both Field and Cust are out then I’d go with Shorrocks at half.

Marshall should be back next week. The plan for Thornley is to play 80 mins for Barrow against Whitehaven next Friday before he’s brought back.

That's what I was told as well. I'd be amazed if Marshall misses next week. I also thought that the Wardle hit was a bad one but given he has no previous he may well escape with a fine.

“Liam should be back in the next few weeks. He had a bad stud on his foot, which was too swollen to stitch.”

Just going off this. Bit vague. Hopefully he plays.

The Wigantoday article headline is Cust field and Marshall are all out of Good Friday although the new reporter covering Wigan isn’t the best so may have got the wrong end of the stick.

Yeah he did say that to be fair but then after that he says...

"We will look at rotating some of our existing squad"

"Ryan Hampshire is out, Cade is out, Jai is out"

No mention of Marshall there which I thought was telling

I don’t think a cut on his foot will keep him out but we’ll see. We could really do with him available if we work on the presumption that Field is out and Wardle will likely be banned.

Worst case scenario is that we'll be missing our 1, 4, 5 and 6 due to injuries and suspensions. Big disruption but a performance like last night will trouble Saints. We let Leigh off the hook so many times in the 1st half with Field trying to score off every play once we got in their half.

It's likely we'll be looking at something like this below. Maybe one of Astley or Forber will have to come in?

French
King, KPP, Thornley, Miski
Powell, Smith
Cooper, O'Neill, Byrne
Farrell, Isa
Smithies

Ellis, Havard, Shorrocks, Forber/Astley

I’d play Astley but it doesn’t look likely with Peet stating post match that we’ll likely use lads who’ve been playing first team recently. Looks like it’ll have to be Powell in that case, with the only other option being an outside punt on somebody like Shorrocks or Wardle (who will probably be banned anyway).

I’ve got to be honest and say that if Astley is a specialist half, is considered to be a first team squad player and they have hopes for him going forward, I think he should be playing. I know it’s an intense game but that can help sometimes, as every player is switched on and covering each other. It’s a weird one with Peets background in the academy but he does seem wary sometimes of giving the juniors a chance in any games bar when we’re resting everyone. A lack of injuries hasn’t aided that but now we have some, there are opportunities not to have to put round pegs in square holes.

I take your point. In some respects its a great game to throw them in. I remember a very young Wigan side beating us at Knowsley Road in 2003 where Kevin Brown had a great game.

In 2017 just after Cunningham was sacked, Grace made his debut on Good Friday at Wigan, scored and had a good game.

Dont worry, we will receive some bans after tonight to even up the players you have injured

I do agree with you on this one. You can guarantee either Knowles, Lees or Sironen will cop a ban, possibly two out of the three

Or maybe they just start playing to the rules?

Brown and Robinson were excellent. We obviously had the famous win in 2003 were a number of kids (lead superbly by the senior pros) played a blinder as well. It’s a baptism of fire but I’m totally the opposite way on it being a bad game to be thrown in to, especially with it being at our place. I’d rather pay him on Friday than I would away at Cas, HKR, Salford etc (days were we might not be as switched on across the park).

Don't sweat it, you'll get Liam Moore as ref next week proudly wearing his I'm from Wigan but totally not biased towards them t-shirt, just like last year

FWIW, it's a sad state of affairs in the game that potential bans are being discussed in relation to the biggest game of the season so far. Wardle shouldn't get a ban, but will IMO.

It speaks volumes of the performance last night that us fans are optimistic about next week, considering the players we'll potentially be missing. We needed a good performance, and we got one.