its more likely to be the other way around.

The money is there to spend, but TS didnt feel it was required.

The money has always been there for TS and PC to spend, if they wanted a player and it cost a fee it was still done. Why would that position change?
TS has put faith in a squad and that faith has backfired.

Just thank our lucky stars Mick Higham has actually improved at a point in his career in which he should be declining.
Thank our lucky stars that a Championship prop defied the odds to become a starting prop internationally.

Without the go forward of those two we'd be abysmal.

hard to really argue with that.... only really Westwood can stand up and be counted with those 2. All the others are a bit 'meh'

I was told that the money was there but the quality was not, he was not prepared to bring in overseas players who are only equal too or less than the quality we aready have, makes sense really. Why buy if what you want is not available. I also believe that the possibility is that the player/s that he wanted may be available this year ??
Who knows.

Here's me thinking we have moved on?

"I thought Bradford were terrific, they out-enthused us. Yeh, we have got some things to work on but we did some good things too; so the squad bus turned up at the stadium on time, and all the guys managed to pull their jerseys on without any help from Bob....."

No I don't think TS has taken Wire as far as he can. He is still a top quality coach, it's his judgement that is in question following the recruitment round, plus (for me) the decision to hang on to an old squad rather than slowly replacing them. But he will be hurting, and his pride will have had a knock. He will wan't to put it right, otherwise there will always be a black mark against his career.

I think where we end up now (at the end of the season), will depend on his ability to restore morale which must be dropping fast. Low morale is the real killer which he has to avoid at all costs; 'that way madness lies'.

There was excitement with change this season. You could argue that Morley, Carvell, Briers and Hodgson had taken us as far as they can, they had reached or were approaching the end of their shelf life. So we replaced them, with Asotasi, England, O'Brien and Russell. That's change. Is it improvement? Is it the edge we needed to take us one more step to be champions....? The evidence so far says no, its a change for the worse, so we have gone backwards.

The same will apply when we change the coach. If we replace TS with an inferior coach, it will be change, change that will take us backwards. I reckon when people start down the path of thinking "its time to replace TS" they are secretly hoping that we will get a master coach from the NRL like Bellamy, Bennett or someone. But the market for coaches is quite barren and has been for a while. Look at the appointments the other leading clubs have made in recent years. Brian McDermott - would you have been happy with him at Wire? Mick Potter? Royce Simmons? Shaun Wane? Paul Anderson? Nathan Brown I admit is a good coach but I would still rate TS above him.

Then there is the market for unknowns in the NRL, you might strike lucky once in a while, Wigan did with Maguire, but its not a guarantee of success, Peter Gentle and Craig Sandercock have hardly been world beaters, neither was that guy that was at Salford for about a month.

And even the biggest hitter Koukash who is throwing money around trying to attract the best to Salford has had to settle for Iestyn Harris as coach.

So don't expect there are a whole list of world beaters waiting for the Wire job. I would say if you aren't prepared to be happy with Noble, McNamara or Millward then be careful what you wish for if you want TS out because that's the type of coach we will get.

Hasler needs a fresh challenge

no argument, they did... its unfortunate we came up short in the 2 big games



i know its football, but people said the same thing about everton for years. You cant hold back on change when the times right.



I think ole gunnar solskaer is taken



you know every well none of those would be considered....

maybe we could change the way people think and appoint a visionary like Phil Clarke.

Everton weren't going to change anything they were quite happy with a coach that had never won anything.

United were the ones that instigated the change. How has that change gone for them?

Everton have done well so far with a coach who at least has a track record of winning something but they look like they're going to have another Everton esque season, get lots of praise, up punching above their weight, miss out on a trophy, not quite Champions League material.



Who do you think realistically would be in the frame for being Warrington coach?

that was an example of a clubs fans that thought their current manager had taken as far as he could.... they were wrong (amazingly)

as good as smith has been, he hasn't delivered the big prize with the biggest backer in the domestic game... lets not pretend everything's rosy. We are on the decline and there is obviously something wrong... lets get one thing straight.. im not saying 'smith out'... im saying if it does happen then im not going to be crying about it... i have more faith in the people running our club than the person picking the team... and that will remain while Moran is in charge.



that doesn't really matter does it? thankfully my opinion has no effect on the decisions made by the brilliant people that run our rugby club.

we're 8th, haven't improved in years, our crowds are on the slide.... were nothing like everton in all fairness.

Exactly, you can't think of anybody better than TS that would realistically be available.

The brilliant people that run our rugby club won't be able to either, and so they will keep backing TS despite annoyance from fans for a season or two. Then hopefully with some good recruitment in the right places, we will be back on an upswing under TS.

TS is going to have to build his second generation Wire team. He inherited a core from Cullen that was ripe for 4-5 years of success, and he milked it better than Cullen would have.

People say now he should have slowly replaced them one by one but what was the point in moving guys like Briers, Hodgson on before they were finished? Should we move Westwood and Higham on now, to start "rebuilding" for the future?

10 years ago United under Fergie were in a similar position and there were questions asked about whether Fergie had started to lose it....he lost some key players from the Treble team and he was signing guys like Kleberson, Djemba Djemba and Bellion that weren't United quality. It took him probably 3/4 seasons to get to grips and build a new generation United team, during which time they were in the shadow of Arsenal and Chelsea. But he did rebuild it and they went on to be dominant again.

If TS wants to stay, I would have confidence that over a 5 year period he can rebuild a trophy-competing Wire team.

i stopped reading after this bit for obvious reasons.

my rugby league knowledge stretches to our home games and sky games..... so to use me as a yardstick against knowledge people that run a professional rugby league club is somewhat foolish.

the 'we we will go downhill after smith' mentality is a bit weak.

how did leeds do after he left?

Leeds did very well because they had a core of winning players and playmakers, Sinfield, Burrow, McGuire. This is what we don't have.

If you have a core of players in those positions of good enough quality, then you don't need to be a genius coach to win trophies. See Millward, McLennan, McDermott. Paul Cullen would have probably won SL with Leeds.

But we don't have them. The world class assets Warrington have are Simon Moran, Tony Smith, Chris Hill and Ben Westwood. You could point to all of them and say they have not delivered the Super League title and so argue to replace them but its easier to replace the parts of the club that aren't world class and leave those bits intact.

and only 2 of them are players.

for a side with the ability to spend maximum cap, and with as much money as you can shake a stick at for transfers... that's very poor and shows why we are where we are.

so out of the 4 world class assets which one would you view as most dispensable?

Westwood because of his age and because there are more good back rowers around so he would be easier to replace.

he's may favorite player



i don't like you anymore.

I wouldn't say Westwood is easily replaced. For me he seems to be the only player in our team that constantly runs his blood to water. Every game he gives it 110% and actually looks as though he is proud to pull on the P&B. After Westwood I'd say he's closely followed by Micky Higham and Simon Grix.

I find it very interesting that TS is always billed on here as a coaxing genius, whilst Wane is the clueless oaf. In his two years at the club he is already ahead of us in the silverware tally!

Part of the problem for me is we have never had the Champion mentality that is inherent in Leeds and Wigan.

Shaun Wane, like him or loath him, he wears his cherry and white heart on his sleeve and expects nothing more than his players to give 100%.
He publicly shows his dissatisfaction if he doesn't get that.

If a player puts in an effort that is way short of his expectations on or off the field, Wane knows the fans are not stupid and would have seen it too. Wane is not afraid to single him out, state the obvious and then drop him or at least threaten to do so if things don't improve to the standard he knows a player can do, like Charnley for example.

Wane nips things in the bud at the point of attention.
TS as I see it, seems to do almost exactly the opposite.
TS is slower to address his post match reviews. Keen only to point out the individual positives not being drawn on the individual stand out poor performance.

TS is unwilling to drop his senior core players if they have a bad game, preferring to allowing them to continue weeks to months before they regain something like what we expect, like Atkins for example.

Rather than nipping things in the bud and dropping or threatening to drop the under standard player after one or two continuous games, in the case of a less senior player, TS prefers to ship him out to another club.
Wouldn't that affect an individual's confidence? Wouldn't it make it harder for that player to play himself back into the team?
Wouldn't it make it harder for Smith to recall that player into the team?

Two very different approaches from Wane and TS. I'm not saying which is correct but unfortunately bias cannot sway my post from looking like I'm leaning towards a cherry and white style.

This is true, our only chance of silverware for years has been the CC, thankfully we have won three recently. The mentality for going the full season we have shown once in the mid 90's and once in 2011 between our CC victories. Leeds having been in more GF's than you shake a stick at and Wigan generally winning one when they get there.

Sadly i stated to the guys i stand with, that our squad would not win a GF because of the mentality thing. Am i correct in thinking that only Morley and M Monas had won a GF? How many of the Wigan team last year had won one? i think like us a couple? therefore why could a couple of there players/coaches spur them on.

Personally the look of things on the pitch leads me to believe that there is something wrong behind the scenes? Losing such quality and replacing with such poor quality cannot help players state of mind.

Briers having to stop should not have come as a surprise, he went to 5 specialist's through the year and was told the same news by each one. Therefore after the second/third the alarm bells should have gone off. Shortly after the altercation Briers had with Ablett at the HJ he and the staff knew what was coming.

Asotasi could be swapped at any local open age amateur club for one of their starting props, i doubt we would be worse off

Before anyone points it out, the arithmetic in my earlier post isn't the best! But in my defence it was 6.30am.

Snaggletooth, what concerned me was seeing how players were entering and leaving the field without acknowledging each other at times. I'm hoping it's just the culture shock of no longer being able to go into these games expecting a win, rather than something that runs deeper.

I was rather perplexed when after the Saints game in round one, the players were taken to Leeds for a meal as a 'team building exercise'. Isn't that what three weeks in Australia was supposed to be all about?

They touched on this on Super League Backchat last night, but as I was in the process of switching off the TV to go to bed (I was recording the programme), I didn't see the full segment.

Did anybody watch it and if so, what were Studd/Irvine/Stevo's thoughts on the situation?

Leeds fans probably have a little more class than we do as well. A couple of years ago when they had Brian Mcdermott in his first year and Brent webb on his way out being replaced by a skinny ordinary centre from the championship, and they had forwards of the calibre of Richard Moore They didnt even question Mcdermott they knew he was the right man for the job even after watching him take the london side from 7th to 9th then 11th in consecutive seasons...

never doubted him.........we should be like them.