When I read the 19 I commented that Bateman would likely come back in if Lockers didn't make it. Stunning that he didn't really considering that he'd had a two week rest anyway.

Bateman will be an interesting test of Wanes selection policy were he says he picks form players! He did it with Manfredi bringing him back for Charnley and Bateman should be the first back rower on the team sheet ahead of Tomkins, Faz and even Lockers.

Quote: Itchy Arsenal "Not sure how playing means that you can't put weight on? Also he had just been off for two weeks so how much rest does a person need? I sincerely hope you are correct and that once again I am wrong.'" I was going off this www.wigantoday.net/sport/wigan-w ... -1-7335210

Quote: Itchy Arsenal "Not sure how playing means that you can't put weight on? Also he had just been off for two weeks so how much rest does a person need? I sincerely hope you are correct and that once again I am wrong.'" I was going off this www.wigantoday.net/sport/wigan-w ... -1-7335210

What do people expect when Wigan's players are going to be hammered for being aggressive by Stevo et al. Flower puts a foot wrong and he will be summarily judged and shot. Imagine if he rather than Simms threw two punches on a prone player.

The contrast in the commentary between Wigan being beaten and St Helens from the same commentary team was obvious. Wigan's reasons were all bad, Saints apologetic. This constant bias has made players demon's in the eyes of many.

Hock, yes he's hot headed but not much different than Westwood in his aggression levels. Newton and McIllurum have both been constant berated while players like Chase and McGuire escape relatively lightly with little said. As for Long, can you imaging the outrage if it were a Wigan player betting against his own team.

The sooner we lose a bais in the commentary the better, many fans have a pop at Phil Clarke but on the whole he is balanced and sticks to the stats. Comments about rugby gods are held against him, in reality a dirty player committed a dirty bit of foul play and got injured. Many call that karma.

That said. There has been a feeling of disquiet at the club for a while. Inform feels like in Clique at times.

WOW

best laugh ive had in ages that

It's much much harder to gain strength when you're playing. If you put on weight without gaining strength, your relative strength to weight ratio is worse. This means that putting on weight could actually decrease performance. Not sure if this IS the reason Wane is using, but it logically makes sense.

It could also just be that playing matches burns a lot of calories. If Bateman is covering 7000 metres of ground in a match as well as making 20 carries and 40 tackles, that's a hell of a lot of additional food Bateman has to eat to gain weight.

Thanks for the feedback and it does explain to a degree the rationale behind the statement.
I thought that they could have used pre season to carry out the physical build up of Bateman.
Always good to learn something new.

I think it was Jonh on here who explained this in some depth a while ago. During pre-season the players will bulk up but they'll probably lose anything between 7lb-14lb during the season due to the aerobic nature of the sport.

The weights promote an anabolic reaction in the body, while the aerobic part is catabolic, bodybuilders won't do much cardio is it catabolic and slows muscle gain considerably, to put muscle on and keep it calories and energy expenditure are monitored closely and any cardio will be of moderate intensity to keep heart rate at a certain level, that burns fat, once you go over a certain BPM the body looks to break down muscle instead which is catabolic. The amount of fitness work they will do combined with game day will limit any muscle gained in the off season.

In short, running makes you thin.

With Bateman, Clubb and Lockers back. How about a pack of

Mossop
McIlorum
Clubb
Farrell
Tomkins
Bateman

Tautai
Flower
Crosby
Oloughlin

Lockers to spell Micky after 30 minutes then at around 55 minutes Macca comes back on and either lockers carries on in the back row or gets spelled?

At this point in his career less minutes for SOL maybe a good thing ?

So we waste a place on the bemch for a player whis obviously finished but too stubborn to retire, no thanks, not for me