Fine post,I agree with you on all points

Joe bullock, Jack wells, Liam paisley, Josh ganson, Liam Byrne, callum field, Ollie partington etc (sure rogues will fill in the etc's) and improved contracts to the Davies's and marshalls and others who may be on salary increment steps.

Whilst that probably doesn't cover all of the money etc it will go a long way and coincidentally we were talking about this Sunday.

For the first time in a number of years I'm not so thrilled with the squad numbers 23/24 upwards (not literally those numbers but I think you'll know what I mean?). We were talking was it worth getting rid of certain players (ganson/worthington/field for example) to bring in 1 experienced front rower.
I think that's the only real weak point of our squad (never been a big clubb fan and our weakness in this position is exposing his weaknesses alarmingly for me, and given tautais contribution or lack of it as well) and I'd rather have 6 front line props.

But the talk then was giving youth it's chance and keeping them and paying them whilst they develop is a double edged sword. For the first time in a while there's a question mark around doing it this way, maybe because of the lack of quality at 20/21 years of age.
But you only have to look at saints who have persevered with Thompson, Knowles, Lee's etc to see what happens when it pays off.

A rough patch sometimes needs a short term answer, but this could also be called knee jerk.
It's a fine line.

It happened pretty quickly after it became apparent the cover up failed.

A good point mate. My take on this is that we are carrying too many squad players that we all pretty much know will never feature consistently in the first team. When we have the likes of Escare and Hankinson struggling to get a run in the side, what chance realistically for Forsyth for example. I think we need to identify players a little earlier in terms of those likely to make the grade and, yes, I know that may mean we get the odd one wrong but I think the alternative is to affect the quality of the squad in the here and now.

We are short of genuine front rowers. The difference when Flower and Bullock were on compared to Clubb and Navarette on Sunday was startling. We need that quality difference addressing immediately if we're to make anything of this season. We simply can't afford to struggle for half the match every week hoping we can turn it round when the 'big guns' come on.

Good points all round here.

We are clearly carrying (and paying) several players who have no real future in the first team.

An alternative argument might be that Shorrocks, who's been a bit of a nowhere man for quite some time, is suddenly looking the part ... so maybe it's equally unwise to dispense with everyone who doesn't initially appear to make the grade.

But yes, it's difficult to see the likes of Forsyth ever storming the heights of Super League. There may well be some wisdom in trimming the squad in a bid to replace quantity with quality.

Agree with a lot of what you say Jukes however, whichever way you cut it I'd suggest that the overall wage bill will be significantly down year on by up to £500k if what I hear is correct.
I fully understood that that this year was going to be tough but only a fool would think that we didn't need a decent 7 and another prop over and above Bullock this year as a minimum.
The quality of the squad is worse year on year and the decline in quality of the squad and the teams performance has continued since 2013.
My worry is this year. I couldn't give shiny shoite now about SE but I am exceedingly worried about our season ahead with a paper thin squad and currently looking like headless chickens for the majority of game time.
Overall IL has done a decent job but unless he or someone else puts some serious money into the squad I don't see any improvement on the horizon

Forgot about Forsyth in my post but he was another who's name cropped up.
I was a big Sutton fan and his name hardly gets a mention when people talk about players who left.
Very durable, played 30 games every year and did pretty good minutes, all in a 22year old. Now it's irrelevant as he was always going this time, just never understood the flak he got compared to 10mins tony, but the point is we are light in the front row and where we could allow Clubb, navarette and tautai half a game here and there they're now our front line props.
We even had Isa doing half a game there mid last season but with the lack of development of Wells/bretherton/field etc our new front 2 (flower and bullock) are seriously exposed for back up.

Roughly speaking we have 3 back up centres, none of which are front line (hankinson I would keep) but the other 2 (Forsyth/Worthington?).
We have isa ( id keep him) and wells/tautai/Clubb, we should only be carrying 2 of them.We need to make a decision on Wells soon.

Coming through Byrne/field/partington/paisley etc. (Rogues could elaborate better than me).
I'd keep Byrne but again decisions need to be made at some point soon on the others.
Ganson is another (I'll go against the grain here as id keep Powell).

I think we're 4/5/6 players heavy on utility type and 2 players light up front in quality.

Top6 and super 8 type league with 10 substitutions is one thing and lends itself to a stronger squad, top 5 means a top 3 finish is ESSENTIAL and with only 8 substitutions and you can't pick and choose and stretch your squad. More quality is needed.

All talking points I accept, but in a contract based sport for player retention it's not easy to make quick/snap decisions and long term planning is essential.

Another couple of wins previously and/or a nice run of results coming up and the world can lol.a lot different.

And its a fine line between making short term/ right decisions and making long term/knee jerk reaction errors.

It's definitely a fine line and one that is almost impossible to get 100% right. I think the only way to set about it is to accept that there will be the ones that get away. That's the case anyway with junior players.

The problem is that I feel we currently have the balance wrong. Maybe it's down to the cost cutting and the hope that we can plug the gap through our junior systems that we seem to be taking a 'throw enough mud at the wall and some will stick' approach. If we had a balanced first team I doubt this would be an issue but we clearly don't. We have 4 excellent wingers plus others that can cover yet have no depth whatsoever in the 2nd row. We have 2 props worthy of the name and an absolute gulf in class below those. We have struggled to cover hooker adequately (until now?) and have yet to find a settled pairing in the halves.

For me it's a case of use the young players if they're the answer or trim the squad to enable 1 or 2 quality signings at the top end of not. Squad depth is great..but not at the expense of quality.

All great points mate but I think the above quote is particularly on the money. Not much has been made of the change in format but, for mine, it's the real game changer and perhaps not something we've planned enough for in our thinking regarding the squad as a whole.

Said before the starting the season to are people and I even think I alluded to it in some posts around that time.

I don't think people remember how difficult the Top 5 is.
And even though it may not sound like a lot 2 less substitutions really put pressure on the middle to do big minutes 45/50+ (Which is how it should be IMO)

I hope we prepared for it, and a few negative results doesn't mean we didn't, but relying on Tony Clubb for 40minutes a week was a recipe for disaster, similar Tautai.
And this is where our biggest challenge is.

Because I don't want to constantly harp back to the 80s and 90s a certain poster thinks I derailed this thread (even when 10 others had commented negatively about this back to the future, make Wigan great again idea that we can just pluck old players out and get them to come in and make us better, they won't, certainly not the ones mentioned).
What I didn't say was I was sat with Andy Greg Sunday morning, if he did say one thing that you could take away it was this, you don't win owt if "The Pigs" don't lay the platform up front for you.

The point for me is club need to start being up front and communicating better. If X player leaves and isn’t replaced then make a point of telling people where the cap space has gone. If Liam Byrne or Olly Partington have improved full time deals then tell us. If by letting Joel Tomkins go it allowed us to keep 3 or 4 juniors then tell us. Everything seems to be secret service with them, to the point that the club didn’t even inform people the U19’s would be live on Wigan TV last Saturday until just before kick off. That isn’t even amateur and simply must improve.

One point I would make on guys like Forsyth, Ganson, Field etc is they’ve been in this squad for a few seasons so they needed to fit their salaries in pre the unreplaced losses of FPN, McIlorum and Joel Tomkins. If it’s because they’re getting salary increases (that players don’t get replaced)it’s unclear to me why that would be because they don’t get the chance to earn them and surely performances and nit just age should be leading to increases (it’s not a YTS scheme afterall).

I’d also point out that lads like Higginson, Bretherton and McCauley Davies we’re in the first team pool last year, so any players then promoted from the 19’s would take their space. Looking at the first team squad numbers only Liam Byrne has been named in this years full time squad who wasn’t in last years (so three younger players out and one in). It’s also worth pointing out that last years squad numbers went down to 39 whereas this year they stop at 36, so the exits outweigh the incomings in more then just rumoured salaries.

It’s all well and good that they trim the squad, promote youth in more senior players places and even cut the playing budget but the communication needs to be far better. There’s been occasions when players sign new deals and we don’t even find out until we realise they must still be at the club because they’ve rocked up at pre season.

surely players deals are confidential, does your employer tell peo0le what you get paid?

It is nothing to do with the fans, of any club, what Joe Bloggs earns.