We can only go off the information published Jon and the facts available to us. Pre Cas, Wane publically stated Powell needed another 6 weeks before he would be ready. Post Cas, Wane has stated he wants to avoid playing Powell v Bradford and that he needs to go on loan to either Leigh or South Wales. I would suggest Leigh would not want Andy Powell at his present stage of RL development.

The question is does anybody seriously believe it was Powell or Andy Coley? We actually had the former GB Academy Prop from a victorious Ashes winning team, a player who for 3 seasons in the academy had played prop 99% of the time available and playing in that team v Cas. Namely, Greg Burke. We had several opyion to play LF if Greg needed to play prop.

Tom Spencer was fit UNTIL Wane allowed him to play for Leigh and get injured.

Greenwood, I believe is fit ? ? ?

So there were better options Jon to play prop v Cas than Andy Powell which IMO shows a lack of duty of care. RL is littered with much bigger Union signings being fed to the wolves before they were ready and then backfiring.

Fed to the wolves

We didn't lose because he played. He didn't get hurt, by all accounts he really enjoyed it. He now knows a lot more about the game and he will know now even more what he has to do to get up to speed.

Ask him if he enjoyed it, ask him if he is now a little wiser about playing rugby league at top level, ask the guy if he got seriously hurt. IMO, duty of care for the sake of 20 minutes game play is way OTT. He will have learned more from that 20 minutes than a month of training.

Some really good points here. But, the Coley thing however was obviously a joke. He had Lauaki, Mossop, Flower, Prescott and Taylor out injured and was probably laying it on with a trowel. Maybe SW will learn there is no place in Wigan for levity!

I much prefer SWs way of dealing with the press, although I am aware that others on here criticise his style. I rather prefer it to Madge's po-faced attitude. Towards the end of his reign I wonder why the press even bothered turning up at Wigan, as he gave nothing away. Not really a criticism of Madge as a coach should be judged by results full stop.

This is a key point. His playing had little or no impact on the result. It could only have benefited him and the club.

I'm not held with my head to the screen. However if I want to read the forums, which I do, and seeing as you can't put moderators on an ignore list, I have no choice but to read his comments, well skip them, reading them or trying to skip his posts, or skip the replies to his posts does get tedious.

I've never been rude of attacked him, I merely want to ignore his posts but I can't without having to filter through each topic.

It's not difficult! Just ignore anything that he posts if you really want to.

I do it with Jonh all the time!

It could have gone horribly wrong too. I never met / read a union conert (even Gallagher) that complained until post career. My own personal opinion is that he is not yet equipped to play for Leigh at top tier Championship level which Tom Spencer clearly is and would gain more from playing for SWales or St Pats.

I have my doubts re the signing simply because of his age and with any convert they do not have the instinctive RL know how of a young League player. Somebody like Greg Burke has already got a decade or more instinctive RL experience / intelligence that Andy Powell will never gain.

Some fans say well he did not do any harm, well IMO he did not do any good either whereas Burke / Spencer / Greenwood could have ADDED to the team on that day. Playing with 12 men in wet conditions is a huge challenge. Why thow him in when the team is tired, depleted and conditions poor?

A question or two; who decided to sign Powell? IL or Wane. Who most wants him in the team IL or Wane. Is Wane under pressure to select him? We cannot say Jon H will rightly says BUT history suggests coaches are always put under pressure to select big name union signings.

In the squad for Friday.

Burke played and was poor on Friday as he was at Wakefield, and looks in need of a rest.

You could well be right Rogues but he could also have done better in the less demanding bar physically prop position and allowed a back rower to play LF. Replacing our best player in Lockers is a thankless task.

I could agree re Spencer not playing as he played on Thursday (I don't think Wane rates him for some reason) Greenwood didn't play for South Wales on Sunday so maybe there was a fitness issue, and I think Powell did o.k.
The weather forecast was for it to clear up around 7 p.m, but sadly they were about 2 hours out

Lockers was a great miss as was discussed on Superleague backchat last night.

I know Leeds fans will beg to differ but Lockers is the best player in SL.

Agree. Jeff Lima recons Lockers is the best player he has ever played alongside.

In the World Cup I would play Sinfield at 9 and Lockers at 13.

Back onto Powell, if he doesn't play on Friday I hope he gets a game for South Wales on Sunday.