Except Fielden's defence and defensive workload is better than both of them (significantly in the case of Prescott) , and his go forward (per carry) is the same as Coley's and 0.1m less than Prescott's, whilst busting significantly more tackles than either of them (yet he's supposedly dominated in every tackle). The only area where Coley is better is offloads and even then it's coming at the cost of more errors and penalties (I would however like to see more offloads from Fielden)

Take Fieldens salary out of the equation and explain to me how Coley and Prescott are better.

Look at the defensive stats and in particular the work around the play the ball.

rlhttp://www.superleague.co.uk/statistics_player.php?hs1


rlhttp://www.superleague.co.uk/statistics_player.php?season

Fielden has made more metres than both Coley and Prescott, made more tackles and bust more tackles.

What's he doing wrong?

And don't forget that this time last year coley was being slated by almost everyone on here.

Stats count for something. It may not tell the whole story but they give an indication of a players preformence imo.

Fielden won't get his old form back imo but his form of last season would be fine if he were on less money.

Thats what Wigan need to sort out if they're to keep him.

lmao ABP, i'm glad we're taking an objective approach to this. In the vast majority of cases I can find, the players who are perceived to be doing well in certain areas of play are also backed up by this on the stats. Now are you honestly saying that Fielden is operating in some sort of Bermuda Triangle zone where he (unlike the vast majority) has good stats but is actually the 4th best prop at our club?

It's doubly amazing that sensible posters, who can see the value of our new training methods and approaches (which include heavy use of statistical data) can be so dismissive of them in this case.

And no, I'm not just blindly defending Fielden I'll do it for any player that's getting unduly criticised. If anybody wants to criticise the amount of money we're paying for the return we get then that's an entirely different arguement and one i'd agree with (he was after all signed at a time when we were in dire straights and his contract reflects what a weak bargaining position the club was in at the time). But to try and make a case where a player isn't as good in areas where clearly the impartial data available backs up that he is? Of course i'll defend him.

You're absolutely correct they don't tell the whole story, but they certainly count and they do align very nicely with the players who are recognised as being strong in certain areas do have the stats to back them up.

One of the stats that does bemuse me is the tackle bust stat. I can't think of one occasion were he's burst through the defensive line. The only thing I can think of regarding this is when he 'bumps' off tacklers and comes backwards. His defensive work is never in question though.

I think if we're all honest about Fielden, we'd admit that we need him to be much more of a force during a match. Yes, his stats are good. No-one says he shirks the hard work. And by all accounts he's a smashing bloke off the field. But we're all long enough in the tooth to distinguish between an effective attacking forward and an ineffective one.

I can think of several prop forwards from earlier eras - Mills, Skerrett, Ward - who probably didn't do half as much work as Fielden, but who I'd rather have in my squad at present simply because they terrorised the opposition and battered their line into submission.

It all boils down to what you want from your front rowers. There are different jobs to do in that part of the field, but I think that being a fierce competitor is a basic requirement.

Compared to his first season with us, Stu is a rather a meek character these days. He never looks like he's going to smash through any more, he never puts some gobshizzer on the opposite side firmly on his butt.

The disappointing thing for me, as others have said, is that occasionally we've seen flashes of the old Fielden, but no more. When we lost to Hull KR at home in mid-summer, I thought he had an outstanding game. He was really up for it. He was breaking tackles, he was defending like a tiger - but then, the following week, the pussy cat was back. That is so frustrating from a fan's point of view.

We need more than just a guy who works hard. We need a soldier.

Unfortunately, stats do not show technique, running angles, speed, opportunities/missed opportunities, pace of getting to feet after being tackled etc etc, the list is endless.

Regardless of what the stats say, Prescott and Coley are IMO much more effective going forward. Coley tends to run wide angles towards the outside backs which is effective and makes yards. He also has a good offload too that our backs have capitalized on by trailing him (stats show this). Prescott is a good, direct runner. After the first collision, it's more than likely he is still on his feet gaining a few more yards before hitting the deck for a fast play the ball. Fielden's general technique tends to be receiving the ball, running mid-pace and ''stamping'' into the tackle which might bump off a defender (which will count as his tackle ''bust''), but it makes him stationary therefore making it easier for the defenders to tackle him and it also slows down a roll on that we're trying to create.

Just an example that stats don't show the above.

Tackle busts is not breaking the line, it's causing by merit of the attacking player the initial tackle to be ineffective, this could result in a line break but may not do. It's still a worthwhile statistic as it causes the defence to have to work harder and make more tackles. We don't have any publicly available stats for line breaks like there is for the NRL, and I think it's line breaks that you're probably looking for in this case (though again a line break can be achieved without physical force as well, so even then it's not exactly what you want)

I know they don't show all of the above, but in your analysis above you're also neglecting that to achieve the same metres per carry you must be doing something ok going forwards (or are the defence just magically creating space for Fielden that they don't for anybody else?). You're also judging Fielden on his 'stamp' technique when if you go back and watch last seasons games, particularly the latter half of the season he'd actually started to adjust his technique and was finding his front quickly in a tackle and facilitating a faster play the ball than he was in previous games and seasons.

You're also not looking at his defence at all, and particularly in the case of Prescott, Fieldens defensive ability and workrate is much higher than any other prop we have, which is why he gets paired with Feka. Trying to pair Prescott and Feka for example would be potentially disastrous defensively. So again the whole picture needs to be looked at. Not only is Fielden playing his own game, he's also acting as enabler to allow us to utilise Feka.

to be fair to Stu he does attract a lot of defenders due to his reputation more than others bar Feka. The difference between here and at Bradford is that you couldnt do that against the Bulls as the next drive they had another awesome forward running onto the ball so you couldnt put as many defenders in as you would want to as they needed to be ready for the next play. Against us you put 3 tacklers into him the next drive from Coley you could put him down 1 on 1 unlike you could do with the likes of Anderson, Vangana and McDeemott.

He does need to step it up I dont think you will find anyone saying he doesnt but 4th best isnt anywhere near the truth. Maybe a new management style will do him good as he has only known the Noble style really as he wasnt with McNamara for long.

The other thing that's completely bizarre, and might contribute heavily to the view that our pack 'gets dominated' most of the time, is how few carries we actually get them to make. Going through the numbers we utilise our front row less than the majority of other teams, yet when we do utilise them they make comparable metres per drive with even the 'best' teams forward packs.

Very strange really when Noble was a 'forwards driving the ball up' type of coach previously.

One more thought that just occurred to me is that our biggest problems in winning games last season were making silly mistakes (either unforced handling errors, or general loose carries), lacking a decent kicking option on the 5th when outside the opposition 20m, and conceding penalties at key moments (either letting the opposition off when we had them heavily under pressure, or putting ourselves under all sorts of pressure when defending)

Basic Rugby skills, organisation, composure and discipline - not 'having the biggest baddest pack in SL'