Tautai is starting to look like a great forward. For the 20 / 30 or so minutes he was on the field last night he made a huge impact. His run and off load, then back up play for the try in the first half was a joy to see. He knew he had done good when he walked back towards the South Stand .... he was grinning from ear to ear ( nice to see). He also put in a great run in the last 3 mins which lead to the Manfredi try in the corner.

I have noticed other people starting to recognise the change in him too ..... someone commented that he steadied the ship in the away win vs Hudds a couple of weeks ago - which I totally agree with.

Fair play to him I say. If he continues to show the improvements week on week he could be a blinder this season.

Bateman ........ well words fail me! He is utter class!! He is really starting to show great leadership..... defo a future Wigan capt, and a genuine Man of Steel contender.

Thoughts?

Last year of Tautai's contract....

So he was intentionally dropping balls and generally having a bad season last year, and has now just decided to start playing?

Tautai was excellent, indeed as he was at Huddersfield. Bateman however had one of his poorer games last night IMO. More errors than normal and more penalties too, I think we can let him off though as that's uncharacteristic.

Tautai did have an impact when he came on, he did get carried away with a poor offload to Bateman. If he runs hard he is an handful and shows some good pace for a big lad. I was also impressed with Burke who put in a good defensive stint, I think in one set him and Flower were involved in 5 tackles. Clubb didnt play for long and looked to be carrying a knock.

Bateman is a good call for man of steel, I dont know how he makes the yards he does, always capable of breaking the line

It was Tautais offload to Gelling and then taking the return pass before another offload to Smith that created Gildarts second try. Fans only want offloads when they work, Cuthbertson would be pilloried at Wigan as about 40% of his go to ground.

Tautai has had a much improved start to the season after a shocking couple of pre season performances. I thought he was one of view who came out of the Brisbane game with his reputation enhanced. I still see him running back in to the defensive line with his back turned too often but there's no doubt he's generally much improved.

Good to see because he seems a decent bloke.

I think last year Tautai may simply have been too eager to make a mark, and coupled with coming into a new team with new plays and a different attacking structure and mentality, probably meant that he didn't quite grasp what was expected of him. For Wakefield he often made quite a few carries each game making well over 100m and also racking up a good number of tackles. He'd also be expected to try to make something happen as they had considerably less quality in the side. At Wigan he will make fewer tackles and also see less of the ball since we spread the ball wide to the back row more often. That may have made him too keen to try to make a big impact with each carry.

Then again he could have just been playing ****

Where's that stat come from?

Out of his

I agree. He let himself get wound up by Salford and wasn't that happy with the ref either. Lost his rag a bit. Any other player and Wane would have taken him off to cool down a bit but that would have left a huge hole in the pack.