We will have to agree to disagree
When the ball went dead he wasn't a couple of inches away, the bounce may have been slightly unlucky etc. But it was a 2 in 10 play for me.
A minute or so later and us defending our own line im thinking if they score here it goes back to the Smith kick.
Cue Crabtree saying "It shows how quickly a game can change" or words to that effect. He was right.

I have no problem with him backing his skills etc. But he has to learn "When, where and how". For me it wasn't the right time, it wasn't the right location and the execution was off.

Overall I thought it was one of his better performances, he was prepared to challenge the line which I like to see (as soon as I saw george Williams at 18/19 you could see he loved testing defenders and was prepared to take the ball in where it hurts).
Hes toughened up last 6months or so and his defense his far better.

It was just the the wrong play at that point in the game IMO

Pretty much summed up my thoughts there.

Singleton has a place in the side. He plays a good part in what we try to do with our defence, as does Partington, but you can only have so many of those types of players.

Saints front row is standalone imo, but like you said we've got them beat in other parts of the field. That's a SC sport really, no one team is dominant from 1-18. I do think that one top prop, tips the overall balance in our favour if not dead even. It's just getting that guy.

Looking at the match stats we actually made 140 metres more than Cas. Significantly we shut down their two main playmakers, Trueman and McShane who only made 14 metres each. Niall Evalds also only made 37 metres.

That's really impressive and is a real life example of how hard we work in defence. That's why I'm not overly concerned that Saints have 2, maybe 3 better props than us. I wouldn't, for example swap Lees for Byrne as Byrne is just perfect for our system/approach. I would however swap Clarke & Clubb for Walmsley or Thompson as they'd only improve us and not compromise one of our biggest strengths.

Cas are very similar to us in how they make their outside backs and back-rowers make all of their hard yards.

Defensive attitude and line speed was a major factor in us getting over the top of them.

Hardaker bringing the ball back was sensational as well. Amazes me that people mention Evalds' name for international reps when we have Hardaker and Tomkins around.

May be harsh here but Joe Shorrocks continues to underwhelm me off the bench. Maybe solid in defence but brings nothing with the ball in hand and we already have Isa, Partington and Smithies in the back-row who already play that role and can tackle all game. Plus Faz and Bateman who are much stronger carrying.

Hope to see KPP given a chance soon as I think he has more raw talent with ball in hand. Not too dissimilar to Gareth Hock, although probably less of a destructive runner.

I just thought in the area of the field he found himself it was worth the chance, especially with the space in behind and giving yourself two chances of getting a result. If you do go for it though, it needs to be spot on and it wasn’t. I know it’s the sort of play Wane would hate for example and I get it but if Lam openly admits he likes to play attacking rugby and he does talk a good game on that front, then we’re going to see more of that and less of us just turning it over in decent position to save having to defend an extra tackle.

Absolutely agree with you that Smith does need to learn when to stick or twist. I thought that was an opportunity to go for something more risky but there were opportunities outside of that where he could’ve tried to get a repeat set but he went for the ultra attacking option. It’ll come in time with age and experience though. I’d rather him work from a base of taking too many risk plays and feel out a good balance, than being that nervous of making errors that he just totally goes in to his shell.

We did an excellent job on Watts as well. He only made around 50 metres and that’s a guy who has run in advance of 150 metres in a pretty regular basis against us and other teams. He’s actually had a really quiet start to the season when I’ve seen him though.

I thought he looked a little out of condition, or had added some unneeded weight.

Certainly nowhere near his best at the minute. When we talk about him as an option here, we’d need to keep an eye on how he’s performing now because as much as we’d love a Liam Watts of 2019, things change and players lose form and head on a downward trajectory. We ideally need the next Liam Watts or an overseas prop who will come in and make an impact.

Coming a bit late to this party but I had problems with the code last year and when I tried it yesterday, then remembered last year I was told you had to activate it on the app first as I was trying to input the code on the website and it kept saying oops something has gone wrong. Activated the code yesterday on the app then watched it on the smart TV

Wouldn't that be awesome if we could swap Clubb for Walmsley! That would have to be the most one-sided swap deal in history!
Saints - We might consider letting you have Walmsley for £600K
Wigan - What if we throw in Tony Clubb?
Saints - In that case we'd want £800K

Watched an interview with Clubb before where he seemed to suggest he’d spoke to Lam and put a case forward that he should start and that Bullock was suited to playing from the bench. If you keep a place on 3 carries and 16 tackles as a starting front row then props are redundant at Wigan. We may as well find more back row forwards and play a full pack of them.

it's like swapping a casio for a cartier. Wait a few months and the Thompson rumours will be here again. Will he go back to saints after being slammed by mcmanus in the media? He is from Wigan isn't he? If he isn't happy in Australia and we have been saving the cap space for a mid season signing I could see it happening. My god he would turn into the devil if that happened. Our phalanged challenged friends over the lump will be burning effigies.

He maybe from Ashton, went to school at Edmund Arrowsmith, played alongside Joe Burgess and Oliver Gildart. However he was/is a big Saints fan and gave his address as one of his St. Helens based relatives so that he could be their service area and played there as a junior.

How must Clark and Kilner feel?