only if he is young enough to get a contract elsewhere, otherwise he will stay put and take the money....lol

His defensive positioning has over the years, been second to none and it's still pretty damn good. He appears though to have lost half a yard of pace and his reactions have slowed down a tad. 3/4 years ago, Finch would never have stepped him like he did. Offensively, he still gets in the right position but again maybe speed is letting him down. Having said that, if Sts don't offer at least another year or some sort of coaching role, he'll be snapped up by some other team. Sts current standing just shows how much losing a player as good as the big red whinger can do to a side.

Did he have half a yard of pace to lose to begin with?!

That's a risky strategy when operating under the salary cap. Surely it would be better to try to get that player resource in the first team squad contributing positively rather than risking the unrest of the others by demonstrating a management ethic that is not entwined with the way in which we want the club to operate. If they're not good enough to get in the team then yes don't play them but dropping a player indefinitely in the hope that your actions will force the players hand rankles. You can have the strong management approach without behaving in such a way. No matter what our beliefs are players are still employees and should be afforded the level of respect that goes with working for a world class sporting organisation. After all word spreads and if we play hardball with players who have done nothing wrong, other than not perform to the levels we expect then that will carry stigma. I'm not against what you're saying but it's a gamble that can have long-term repercussions for our external recruitment.

Oh FFS.... What is wrong with you anyway? Noone is arguing that many Saints players are massively underperforming and many have for a long time, while Wigan are all riding the crest of a wave - similar to the reversed Saints/Wigan situation immediately pre-Maggie with many of the same players in situ on both sides in fact. Would you have argued that every single one of Wigan's players were worse than every single Saint back then? Don't be so patently one-eyed and ridiculous.

Many/Most of Saints' current squad would outperform most of Wigan's given the same coaching and tactics. At the moment they're performing like a pile of cack because they aren't and haven't for nearly 4 years now. That does not make them bad players for the rest of eternity...

Whilst Wellens has been the second best FB in the SL era (behind Radlinski), he didnt have more than a yard of pace to begin with and 3/4 years ago a cr@ppy wigan centre with no knees skinned him and went the length of the field at the JJB

Seeing as Wellens hasn't mentioned retirement, coupled with the fact I think he would want to be a one club man, I can only see another deal coming his way at the end of the season. If it is on vastly reduced terms, with the remit that he is to be used as backup only, I would be happy with that. However, if he still going to be our starting FB, then no, I don't think we should offer him a new deal. Let Lomax, Makinson, Gaskell or Swift try to stake a claim for the shirt.

I'd be happy giving Ade a new contract, if he returns to full fitness. He may not have much in the way of pace now, but his yard making out of his own in goal/10 meter area is excellent, and we could use that whilst allowing for a flyer (or as close as we have to a flyer) taking the other wing spot.

Wheeler - at the moment I am leaning towards letting him go. Unless he can go through the remainder of the season injury free, he should probably be moved on to allow Percival/Jones time to settle into the position.

Hohaia and Perry - I would seriously be looking into mutual releases. Perry has shown nothing like the form he showed in Oz, and is an incredibly costly spectator at the moment, or a vastly ineffective Prop on the rare occasions he now takes to the field. Not needed. Lance, I feel sorry for. This season he has been shown to be the square peg we didn't need for that round hole. If the rumours of his deepening home sickness are true, then I could see him released back to the NRL and a replacement brought in, to allow Lomax to move to FB.

Manu is also a 50/50 for me. Great player on his day, and he is still producing the stats to back this up. Also seems relatively injury free. But... he is coming to the team where players go to die, and I am sure within 4 weeks he will be rendered utterly useless as a player, yet still racking in the coin of a 3 year deal. I am torn with rumours of us cancelling the contract offer. He could do really well for us, or he could bomb. If Brown has a different replacement in line, then that could be an avenue worth exploring.

Brown also needs to light a fire underneath LMS. Can be excellent on his day, and the games against Leeds and Warrington showed that he can do it against the 'top packs'. He just needs to start reproducing this form on a more consistent basis.

Is there a possibility we could lose TP at the end of the season I wonder? If he continues with these niggling injuries, he could just decide enough is enough?

Gardner? A new contract? Hells bells, he shouldn't have got his last one.

We have Ade till next year already. Extending any further people will start to think he has some hold over the club.

I could see fans removing a player, but if a club does it they do play a risk with him just saying there are no better offers I'll just sit it out and take the cash.

If we already have him for next season, then I amend my comments to allow him to play out his contract here.

Gardner is on contract until end of 2014 I think.

I'm also worried about TP. I just hope we don't need a TP for our (bung) hole next season.

Brown makes suggestions of who he wants but McManus negotiates and gets the players. He is in control of the wage structure within the club.



Lomax played full back in the reserves. Lomax reminds me of Burrow a little bit - clearly a very good player but doesn't really have a set position, but he'll give it a good go anywhere. He's done a good job at 7 to be fair to him, but I don't see him as natural half back. He doesn't really have the consistency in his passing or kicking, he's not a natural organiser and some of his decision making is dreadful at times. I think he'd make a really good full back, chiming into the line and using his step and speed to take players on, that's what Lomax enjoys doing along with backing players up with his support play. I did acknowledge Makinson in my previous post, another who could potentially play there without question, but Lomax is the more experienced player of the two.

I'm kinda gutted Eastmond went off the rails and left us, he could've been absolutely electrifying for us at full back for us, like Tomkins is for Wigan. Sure he has some defensive deficiencies but his attacking prowess outweighs that massively. Nathan Brown would love coaching a player like Eastmond.

You have to bear in mind when commenting on Lomax's decision making, That he is a youngster and has had little or no support from his half back partner.

When that was Gaskell, Gaskell was selfish and Lomax was unable to get any consistancy into his game.
Now with Lance, he is pretty much being left to do everything. This has shown the positive side to his game but has also highlighted some minor weaknesses. With a functioning half back partner either at stand off or scrum half we will see the best of him and all will look back at this time of his career and say "What were we thinking of doubting him".

You seem to have found something funny. Care to explain what.

Calm down. I wasn't trying to be provocative. The key words were "on current form". Yes you have some real quality but most of those players aren't delivering. Some of it is down to coaching and some down to the players' own work ethic. I think the standards and culture of the club have gone a bit awry.

I was sniped at on the Wigan board in the mid-noughties for saying that standards had been slipping and that the culture of the club was wrong and that we needed to clear out the backroom staff as well as the coaching staff and a number of players. I wasn't the only one saying this, but most did not want to hear. Second best had become acceptable and the will to win/fear of losing wasn't there anymore.

We did have a radical clear out of coaching and backroom staff and some changes to the squad. The end result was that the old Wigan standards and culture seem to have come back. Whether or not SW is as shrewd a tactician and technical coach as MM remains to been, but there does not seem to have been any lowering of standards.

I suspect Brown will do a similar job for you that Madge did for us, but you will need more than just one person to get your players playing to their potential. In addition, the players need to take more responsibility for their own underperformance.

Going all the way back to the OP, I can't say I entirely agree.
Meli and Gardner are top of your list. If your wingers are the first thing we complain about then your not doing to badly.

Wigan beat us as a team. Look at the way and the speed that they worked in defence. Go back to Wellos break, watch him get tackled and watch him play the ball. Now look at the Wigan defensive line - it was set, it was orgainsed and it was intact. Now have a look at ours whenever Wigan had a 1/2 break, it would be broken, players ambling back into position.
Even when we're set, we don't move up like we could, instead letting the attack come to us, which allows their forwards to get on the front foot, whereas they move up quickly and as a group to meet us.

Wigan are superior at this because they are either better drilled, fitter or want it more (or a combination).

That's what won it for them. After they'd achived this, we were never going to get many points. Their icing on the cake comes from a wonderful set of moves which they normally execute better than they did on Saturday.

In terms of players, the stand out differences are #1 & #6. They do have an exceptional back row unit as well, in my opinion. Soliola is one of our best players at the moment, but Wilkin was quiet and Flannery, although reliable and a good alrounder, is short of the quality we need. Flash has some nice big hits in him, but on the whole is no more than an honest toiler.

Our front row options are good, no matter what you like to say. TP, Laff, LMS, Clough and Perry are as good a collective as any and imo will be one of Brown's smallest concerns. I honestly don't rate magennis that highly as I feel he's easily dominated.

The difference between Finch and Hohaia is vast. Put Finch next to Lomax and he'd have a field day, just as he did when he and Gaskell had that purple patch. Finch would reign instructions, orgainse the team and allow Lomax to go about terrorising the line and sucking guys in.
Whilst Hohaia obviously has had some talent to get to where he is, the moment he took the wrong option after Makinson's break confirmed what we've all been thinking - that's he's not capableof being the organiser, planner, brains of a team. Finch would also give us a kicking game (and defend better).

Wellens. He's playing better now than he has for a couple of seasons and its credit to him that he make the best of what he's got, but as Millward pointed out, due to lack imput by Hohaia, Wello has become our prime go-to man and i'm afraid he offers neither pace or slickness of hands to fulfill that role against the big teams.

So yes, pull the trigger. Working with what we've got, I'd go with
#7 Hohaia. He's a robust carrier of the ball and could play to the line and tease the big forwards, as Lomax has done.
#6 Natural 2nd receiver and the nearest we've got to an organiser. He's also the best kicking game in the club.
#1 Lomax. Let him take the ball moving and run with it.

Wheeler. I'm one of those in the pro wheeler camp who's coming to the end of their tether. I wouldn't have dropped Jones for him because I know he'llbe out injured again soon. If rumours are true about him having a lack of professionalism about his conditioning, then I'd stick him out on loan to prove himself in an eviroment that has fewer preconcieved ideas about him.

I'm very positive about the future under Brown. A lot more than some on here. I don't think he'll need to change the personel much to get us to be genuine contenders.

the games against Leeds and Warrington showed the standard that this group of players is capable of, the question is why did they not play anywhere near that standard before or after those 2 games.

In those 2 games, you could see that the forwards wanted it. They wanted the ball, and they ran it in hard and straight. They dominated the collision, and either managed to either get an offload or earn a quick play the ball. The games since has seen them ambling the ball into the ruck and getting dominated. They are not getting the chance to get a quick play the ball, and they are not looking for the offload.

I dont expect World Class every week, like we saw against Leeds in particular, but conversely I dont expect 'going through the motions' like we saw on Saturday. It is up to the coaching staff to coach the work ethic and behaviours we see when the players want to show it.

You've [iread [/ithe OP, but you clearly haven't [iunderstood [/iit. I was discussing those players whose services we should be looking to dispense with rather than listing the manifold problems we need to address in order of priority.



No one disputes the tactical flaws within our game. But attributing a victory to Wigan [isolely because of coaching[/i is pure speculation. Are you saying that had Saints taken the field with Greg Inglis, Billy Slater, Jamie Lyon etc. their prodigious abilities wouldn't matter because Wigan's tactics made success inevitable - regardless of the opposition?



Seriously, have you READ anything I've said? Please point out my criticisms of the front row (or even the pack).



I didn't mention Hohaia. As far as I'm concerned he's still adapting to our game. It is not unusual for imports to take anything up to a year to adapt. I should point out that Finch hardly took SL by storm early in his Wigan career.

Attitude. It's something I've been harping on about all season. I don't like the attitude of some of our senior players and I think that attitude is simply most clearly seen in Wigan derbies, when fans notice because those derbies mean the most to most fans.

I know I [isaid[/i "going back to the OP", but, once I started typing, it quickly turned into a general musing. When I typed you, I didn't mean you, I meant, y'know, the royal you.

No but at least Finch Is a natural half. Hoahia has never been and never will be one.
Were treading water playing him there. Ive absolutely no doubt that Brown wont play him there.

Brown has publicly said he doesn't see Hohaia as a HB.

I was just trying to nice, put a positive spin on what is a dark era for tuther side of the lump. Seriously though, Wellens always, usually, has a good game playing against Wigan and I particularly admired him for coming back after he got his cheekbone smashed. Think it was his first game back with the a ball bobbling all over the place. Looked at first that he'd jibbed but he dove at the onrushing attackers feet, risking the same injury, when he could just have taken his time. Takes some courage that.