Quote: Major Tom "Shows how you can't necessary judge a team by the names on the team sheet.
I've recently watched the 2000 and 2001 grand finals again and some of the players we had then were superstars. Radlinski, Robinson, Renouf, Connolly, Dallas, Johns, Lam, Newton, Furner, Farrell, Betts played in one or both games.
Yet they lost to St Helens in the final having finished top of the table and lost 54 16 in the grand final qualifier at home. The next year they finish 2nd to Bradford on points difference lost a relatively close grand final qualifier and then got destroyed in the final by a bulls team who, at the time, had a reputation as big game bottlers.
Does anyone remember if there were any extenuating circumstances that led to scores like 16 54 and 37 6 in big games from a team that looks to be full of class. Were they over the hill or mercenaries who didn't care? Either way, I've seen people say they would batter the current team but on the evidence of their respective performances in big games it would be the other way around. They don't seem to have the spirit, physicality, desire, commitment or discipline that the current team have and which cant be seen on paper.'"
The 16-54 result was very bizarre. IIRC, Wigan just seemed to stop trying half way through. Everyone was mystified.
I seem to recall, though, that despite the plethora of apparent star names at Wigan around that time, there was still a feeling of decline. Crowds were down, people sated by success or simply not liking the new stadium. We weren't a shadow of the team we'd been five years earlier, Bradford and Saints above us in terms of pure quality (of those names you mention, Johns was a big disappointment and Betts was nothing like the force he'd been). We'd also started to lose players to RU - Robinson's departure stunned us, and we only hung onto Rads by the skin of our teeth. Latics had just got promoted and we were constantly hearing that Whelan was going to turf us out. Whelan was also on a sack-the-coach binge whenever we failed to win silverware.
The CC win in 2002 was a blip really. More telling were the Cup Final defeats - against Sheffield (!!!), Saints and Bradford. To lose four finals would have been unthinkable at Wigan a decade earlier. I reckon it was all downhill from around 1998 to our near-relegation season in 2007 (or whenever it was).
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