Unfair, Smith has played behind a beaten pack most weeks. How many folk believe half backs can produce their best behind a beaten pack? His half back partner is too slow and should have retired end of 2020. Smith is also trying to make things happen with all these matters against him. He's working with one of the most useless coaches Wigan have had in SL. Thankfully Smith is going nowhere.

I think the resting comment was made by Lam as a nice way of saying players will be dropped.

Funnily enough after tonight only one of our halfbacks from today is in the top 10 in Superleague for setting up tries - Harry Smith. The other halfback doesn't even register in the top 20 and the stats stop after that.

He's being asked to carry a team behind a beaten pack most weeks with zero help from his considerably more experienced partner. Maybe we should change the name in the title?

Agree with this. Too much pressure and expectation on him at the moment.

The coach doesn’t come up with poor reads in defence and consistently pass the ball totally inaccurately, put the ball out on the full regularly.

The errors he is making are not complex they are very basic skills.

If it was Jai Field making the same mistakes he would be crucified.

I believe at the moment Smith and Powell are killing us with their failure to control/direct play, their passing accuracy and their lack of threat.

I'm not disagreeing with you (although I still think there's a decent player there), but Lam keeps sending him out there week after week, regardless of performance or improvements. Hanley had a very solid game Vs Hudds and that was the opportunity to move JH back to 6.

He's killing us with stuff like that and I think he's killing the players too.

I agree I think Hanley played well and was surprised not to see him play tonight given the form of our halves.

What concerns me about Lam is the fact he has been bigging up Smith trying to justify the Hastings to 1 move despite the fact he had been poor.

Spot on, to TL. At least Harry Smith tries to be creative, (see Liam Marshalls 2nd try)., and does have failings in his game, but someone tell me what TL brings to the team to avoid criticism that HS receives ?

That's one of my main gripes wth Lam. He seems unable/unwilling to change course, stubborn even. The Hastings @FB thing is just one example. His selection of Clubb and non selection of Clarke is another. We don't even need to talk about Hankinson either.

I said it a few weeks ago but it’s clearly a pure lack of confidence and/or belief in what he’s being asked to do. The Harry Smith we’re seeing now isn’t the one that burst onto the scene.

As it happens I agree with your Jai Field point.

Tommy needs dropping ASAP. JH into the halves and Hanley FB.

I felt bad for Smith tonight, I know someone mentioned about being behind a beaten pack, I didnt think that was an issue tonight, but you had a very rigid plan of attack, going at our right edge, and some of his passes, and passes to him weren't accurate.

Not as bad as the game at your place.

Meanwhile leuluai was nowhere to be seen

Just as an aside, wtf were you doing going down our right, we had a prop with crap cardio on the left

Needs a few weeks out the fire and has done for a while. I feel for him, as having to play on the back of that front row all season is enough to ruin any young halves career but he’s also playing under Lam and when you add them together, he’s on a hiding to nothing.

I just hope he can bounce back from this season because once your confidence goes as a young halfback and you have a tough time, it’s not easy to bounce back.

People getting on a rookie half back whose being asked to run the show.

Yet our experienced captain goes has been missing all year.

Weird.

Harry is not the main problem for me.
If we put a fullback at full back and our best half in the halves then it may help him a little. We could also have took the pressure off his kicking by letting Hastings kick. He has no threat by his side bothhTommy or Powell offer almost nothing to open teams up. You can get away with them if you have French out the back along with Hastings as a playmaker but it would be better if we only had one bon at a time for me. I'm fine with Powell at hooker for 80, if we had French Hastings and maybe field. Though can you imagine if we ha a little more from 9.
I thought Singleton played well if anything the forwards laid more than enough to play behind

Yes Tommy was poor.

Tommy has earned his stripes though and still controls the game.

Smith does very little organising.

Smith is 21. He’s had a year in SL I’ve yet to see him string any quality performances together.

He looks totally lost all I see him as being is a link man. Halves need to do more than just pass the ball to the other half to boss it.

Seems to me .like for most of the season we've been saying, what can you expect from halves playing behind a beaten pack, but that refrain doesn't really hold true for the last two games, does it, where we have had plenty of field position. What threat do we pose when we get to or opponents' 20? Not much. Smith put in a couple of accurate kicks, and we got a few set-restarts, but it didn't amount to much. We don't scare opposing defences. i'm not convinced Smith is any better than Hampshire, say, right now, but it's certainly true that he has had an unrealistic burden.

We don't pose any threat from two of our three starting halves from tonight's team but Smith at least does on occasion. With our best half at full back and without our main cutting edge French out the back we are seeing our issues highlighted. The pack was decent tonight but have not been for most of the season. The sharpness of our plays will take some time to cluck. Now we have a platform to play behind I'm hoping Field, Bateman, Zak and Gildart and Marshall getting game time will help a little over next few weeks. You may then see Smith find life a little easier than it's been in a team without backs and a beaten pack.

Lam has completely wasted a year of Smith's development by not playing him alongside Hastings

Tommy was a passenger in that game last night. Literally watching the ball go by. There was a few times I clocked him just strutting round watching Hastings run laterally. He did nothing, offered nothing and looked like he couldn’t be bothered in all honesty. He wasn’t in control of that game in any way whatsoever. To be blunt I don’t know who was.

I think you’re being harsh on Smith, whilst I can see where you’re coming from and you make some good points, there’s far too many other circumstances preventing him being the half he can be. The grand master of them all is one Adrian Lam.

Is it surprising that Smith is not doing well at the moment when we have a pack not dominating the forward battle and Leulaui not performing as he should do.?

Leulaui "having" to play is as far as I am concerned is the reason why Hastings has been playing full back and Smith not playing well for the reasons I have stated.

You have hit the nail on the head with what you have said about who should pay where!

12m from Smith last night. TL 47m.

Powell 11m.

Big issue when you are relying on your fullback out of the spine players to make all your yards.

Smith and Powell in particular simply not challenging the defence with their running game.

I’ll cut Smith a bit of slack because of his inexperience, even though he’s all over the show with his passing and decision-making. Powell though, I’ve never rated as a 9. He may as well stick 13 on his back and take a few drives in as a ‘middle’ for all his attacking threat.

I thought Powell was outstanding last year. Mixed his game up very nicely and looked to be one of the success stories under Lam.

This year though he’s a major part of why we are unable to break down defences.

Sadly correct. I’m not a Powell knocker by any stretch, I think he’s a good player but he’s way off this season. He looks fatigued to me and I can’t help wonder if he’s playing injured. Even in just 3 or 4 minutes and two carries, Amir Bourouh offered more of a threat with the ball. It’s another area of the field Lam refuses to see what’s in front of his face. A rest for Powell, be that during games or by sitting the odd one out, is something we can do with the two young hookers we have and Leuluai capable of playing in there but Lam seems to love to push forwards to breaking point, like it’s some sort of iron man competition he’s running.

It's unbelievable that Powell came through the academy as a half. He looks like he's had all skill coached out of him; can barely run with the ball, can't beat players, average kicking game. Just a tackling machine like someone already said.

I think he is about to sign a new contract but to be honest I would let him go if we can sign a decent, experienced hooker who can play 50-60mins and allow O'Neil/Bourouh to come through.