Same applies to Miski

I too was watching the football in a pub with one ear to the Radio & at the time thought Misko had dropped 2 Howlers!!!!
On review that is far from the case (Even now I;ve seen people on the other site describing them as 2 x mistakes).
He lost 2 challenges, they weren't mistakes, and the first one in particular was very Dubious and could have been called a penalty with the 2nd one being anything other than a mistake, he may need to be better/stronger, but it wasn't a mistake or a howler. And in fact the tacking after the challenge is the real issue, walked through 3 tackles.

His worst contribution isn't even being talked about, it was the drop on the 1st/2nd tackle coming away from his line.

But again I agree it comes back to people following the Loudest voice, which in this instance due to it not being televised was Joe Mills (And Bilko).

I rang my mate after I had seen the 2 Toulouse Tries from kicks and he said the impression I gave him was completely different from what he heard on the radio - He watched the game Monday and rang me and said he agreed. Whilst Miski may be disappointed, they were anything but Howlers.

Again with a review of the whole game and Harry Smith in particular I was expecting a Horror show. Watched ,sot of the game last night, and whilst I would say we were anything but Good, we were more lethargic and Lax rather than Awful.

As you say - Ball in hand we were still pushing and trying to be expansive, we had good offloads, we just defensively didn't build a platform and compounded that with 6/7 poor errors from 20mins through to 60 mins ish.

I'm far from convinced about Smith, but the Barracking he gets on the other site in particular is disgraceful. It's the same with Powell (And on occasions Isa).
it's now become a case of certain fans having made their mind up and it's more important for them now to be proved right than it is to give honest reviews & appraisals of the players contributions.

Jack Wighton makes more errors per game than I think most half backs I've ever watched - but makes as many if not more positive contributions.

My take on it and have not seen the game on Wigan t.v. yet but was the game.

First and foremost it was great weekend and so good to see many fans who we haven't seen for a long time due to covid, if you get a chance it's a must see place and certainly one we'd return to.

The game itself was strange, the way we started it looked we would win by 40 points, Harry Smith was kicking well, the chase was good and very few if any errors.
What changed I've not a clue but the things we'd been doing right we began to do wrong, penalties, errors, missed tackles etc. The first try we conceded I really need to see again as it looked to me as if Miski had been tackled in the air. We get back in the game after halftime and straight after scoring let the ball go dead from the kickoff!! Then Miski misjudged the 40:20 from which Toulouse score, schoolboy errors.
The match savior was Joe Shorrocks charge down of what would have been the winning drop goal, step up Harry Smith who whilst not having a great game was nowhere near IMO as bad as many are saying, and they probably weren't at the game.

I'll sit back and watch it again now and see if my opinions change.

Edit, remiss of not to congratulate Toulouse, they played well, should have won the game if they had controlled things in the last 15 minutes.

As mentioned it's a clean slate for me for Smith, however he has probably earned less of a grace period than others under the new regime.

The main problem I have with him was last year from the friendly vs York he made certain poor errors and continued to make the same poor errors throughout the season, in particular kicking out on the full and poor passing accuracy.

I think it's probably very hard to judge him on other elements of his game such as taking the line on and directing the play around which again was poor but I will also put that down to the "Hastings Effect" given he was so dominant.

I've still yet to watch the game in full so can't comment on his performance against Toulouse I was simply going off hearing other comments abut it from those who were there (who would not influenced by any commentators).

Not a fan of the Wigan TV commentary. Bilko is fine but Joe Mills resembles one of those self-entitled fans who instantly overreacts and throws his toys out of the pram when something goes wrong. You wouldn't see the level of criticism he gives to the team/individuals from neutral commentators so not good to see it on Wigan TV.

Bilko is excellent and analysis is spot on.

Joe’s normally okay but he does overreact a little bit to stuff. “TERRIBLE DEFENCE AGAIN” any time we concede.

Normally good though and I thank them both for doing it.

I think Joe Mills and Bilko do a good job. I really like Joe Mills passion and enthusiasm for the club and was just a little surprised how negative he sounded on Harry Smith after watching the game in full but it's understandable that some heat would come on one of your playmakers, when he's the main change from a team that has been going very well to date. The two guys did make a great point of how Cust had swapped sides to accommodate Smith coming in and how that had impacted on the whole side and Cust himself (who did not have his best game). I thought that point probably should have been focussed on a bit more than Harry Smith's individual performance. The main issue ultimately was the silly errors and some really poor individual defence and whilst we had some clunky attack at times in the game, us scoring 29 points in a game would've felt like Christmas last season.

Agree. Bilko is excellent, Joe Mills is the absolute opposite.

Another night or different officials one or both of the tries involving Miski would have been chalked off.
His worst mistake if I viewed it properly was letting a kick go into touch resulting in a 40/20. Lack of concentration or low in confidence I’m not sure but hopefully he’ll learn and come back stronger but unless there are injuries I think some more time in the reserves awaits him.
Far from a great debut but you can’t write a lad off after one game.

Honestly don’t remember anyone being too highly critical of Smith on the night but he did have a mixed bag of a game. Although Toulouse threw it away and we weren’t at the races I was strangely confident that if Smith got a chance he would drop the goal. Unsure what to make of Smith but I’d like to think that there is decent player there. The vast majority of the team had an off night particularly after the first ten minutes so for me we haven’t seen Smith playing in a fully functional team since he’s made his debut.

As a fan I was more concerned and I am most weeks, about the teams collective performance rather than individual performances. I don’t think one player had a really good game so picking out individuals for me doesn’t really add to the debate. We were second best for the majority of the match and the second game in a row were our pack was second best.

At times without the the ball we were slow. Very slow. This for me more worrying than Smith giving out a couple of misjudged passes. I’m just hoping that we held something back on Saturday with the Catalan game coming up. I’m certainly hoping that our playing tempo is increased by several notches because if it isn’t it could be a long night. I’ve got a feeling that Saturday may have been a wake up call for the players and I genuinely anticipate a much stronger and faster showing against Catalan. Whether that’ll be enough we will have to wait and see.

I wasn't sure about the 40:20 and couldn't see if he was Lax in stopping it or if the kick was awkward/misjudged etc.
The Harry Smith & Miski criticism seems to have emanated from the commentary as 99% of people at that time couldn't view it for themselves, and thus the Myth perpetuates.

I don't & haven't listened to Joe Mills & Bilko a lot (no more than couple of times inc. Saturday) so not best placed to assess and my only observation is I think they're a good pair. Mills provides the enthusiasm and dynamic whilst Bilko does a good seconds job and comes in with good observations & statistical stuff
I would say that any commentator who is associated to their own club though needs to understand the situation a little differently than a professional commentator as a neutral say, in that they are viewing those players week in week out, serving their commentary in the main to one set of supporters and their Bias/observations etc. can magnify issues either favourably or negatively dependant on how the commentator views situations i.e. Last week you would think Miski & Smith were 99% responsible for that result - Yet other players escape criticism when for example it suits the commentator (Understandably) to magnify the plus points of players such as Field & Mago & KPP for example for entertainment purposes and in turn they escape criticism sometimes when they should get it.

I said at Weekend and have used this analogy before, we were in a similar position in Maguire's first season, winning 20 nil at Bradford and losing 22-20
At the time coming off I said to my mate who was fuming - The one positive was that the following week (Hull at Home - Who had a Very strong team with a Very Big & Strong pack) we would get an answer to a very important question.
Are we as good as we think we are? Was the Bradford game a Blip? or was the first 4 weeks of the season the Blip and we weren't as good as we thought we were.

Whilst I don't think this is exactly the same I get the same feeling
Were the first 3 weeks the Team/Us riding a bit of a Good feeling wave etc. and over hyping/exaggerating our abilities and chances?
Or, was it a blip and we got Lax, which in turn will give us the kick up the backside we need and remind us that we need to be 100% in regards to attitude and effort week in week out

Obviously I'm hoping it's the latter - But either way this is all part and parcel of the journey and what makes us intrigued by the sport
If the Recipe for success was stagnant and predictable there would be little to ponder over and discuss and everyone would be doing things the same way

Saturday was Peets/New Coaching structure & players first little Bump - How will they react?

Can't wait to go again Saturday and find out
Putting my neck on the block here - But last year I predicted a massive good hiding at Catalans as I could tell 7/7 or not we were woeful
This year I think the Effort/Structure/Coaching etc. is much improved and we'll give it a good go & win or lose (Which can always happen at Catalans even when they aren't as good a team as they are now)

I have to say while not having seen the full toulouse game one are we do need to improve on is our line speed in defence. We allow the opposition forwards to get on too much of a roll when we should be shutting them down before they get going as Saints do.

I’m torn on this. It’s something I’ve been sat thinking about at times this season and all roads lead back to thinking how we close that gap to Saints. Yes their line speed is unbelievable and I wonder if we can try and replicate that but I keep coming back to the same point- we will need beat them at that game when we play them. To play a game of us meeting fire with fire and flying off the line, we’ll have to accept it’s likely to be decided through the middle of the field and we’ll be using an awful lot of energy in doing that. Are we good enough to beat them through the middle? Not a chance IMO.

I’m not saying we can’t up it by the way but to replicate it, you need to go all in on it, week in, week out and accept that we’re unlikely to see sparkling attacking rugby (as Saints fans don’t). I think we just need to find our style, our identity and way of doing things and in fairness to Peet, I think he is trying to do that. It’s been a positive start but with plenty to work on. We can certainly put more energy in to defence but I’m just hoping it’s a time and place thing and when the time calls for it, we’ll see an uplift in intensity defensively. We’ll need to see it on Saturday and I think we will but we need a balance between good defensive intent and not getting sucked in to a forwards battle. Against Catalans and in particular Saints, we’re going to need to reserve plenty of energy for when we have the ball and try and run them and keep turning them.

Hope you are right with the Bradford analogy.

During and after the game I was bitterly disappointed with the performance.
It was like being in a bad dream thinking that Lam was still head coach.

The day after I got to thinking what was good about the performance other than the start and the finish.
A bit of a struggle to be positive but then I thought we didn’t panic and we kept playing rugby. Not always great rugby but we didn’t fall back into one man rugby which I think we owe to the new coaching structure.

I do think that Field’s pace has covered over some cracks which for me is our lack of speed without the ball, slow ptb and I don’t think that squad is particularly well balanced with too many versatile players and not enough quality experts in several positions notably centres, wings and to a lesser degree the backrow. We still lack that top class prop (could be Mago but he’s got to step up much more for me on a regular basis to be even considered a very good prop) who can do long minutes.

What we have got is better structure and more self believe which if we sprinkle in sublime talent of Field, KPP and hopefully Mago we can give most teams a good game and a good base to build on.
I’m quietly confident of a big improvement against Catalan.

Agree with you re Bilko and Joe Mills. I think they compliment each other but Joe at times can go a bit ott.

I’ve got a feeling our intensity on Saturday will be several times higher than versus Toulouse.

add French to that also will add a bit of dynamic play hopefully

I also think Havard with the solid work of Ellis and with Singleton, Smithies and Byrne improved will add a lot over the season once back into this team. Mago gives us that X factor impact into that equation. How good are we, well definitely better to watch than last season but with a few tests to pass. I think at season start we would all of took what we have seen as a huge positive.

I don’t want to derail the thread so apologies. However not sure where you are getting this idea (again) of Saints fans not being happy with our attack?

42 points away from home last Friday, we looked sublime. Our left edge of Matuatia, Percival and Makinson looking superb. Dodd is showing his class week on week now too. Let’s not forget we have a brand new spine this season, our first choice left winger hasn’t played yet, we’ve had brand new centre/wing combinations on the right side most games and Makinson has played on the left rather than the right all season.

Wakefield is the only real game so far that we didn’t get going and stuttered a little. Not sure what more you want us to do? Have you seen our points difference?

I’ll give you HKR, I didn’t see it, so can’t comment but I’ve seen your other three games and the attack functioned as a result of your defence. Grinding the opposition down and picking them off in their 20. It isn’t traditional attacking rugby (that Saints are famed for) by any stretch (maybe at HKR it was try’s from all over the field, 60,70,80 metres, I don’t know).

We’ve had great points differences in the past and been much the same in terms of a style of play. You score your points through your defence IMO and one or two individuals bring a bit of magic. In terms of my post, I’m saying for us to replicate that is pretty much impossible. Saints clearly put so much time and energy in to practicing that, as well as Woolf coming up with his ‘energy saving’ tactics.

I actually think that you could cause us some real problems this season when we play. Any team with genuine pace could (if utilised correctly) get around our linespeed.

Wakefield caused us a whole host of problems, they kicked early, went wide early in the tackle count and were genuinely inventive and different. I can’t recall a team making as many line breaks and half breaks against us for a long time. We scrambled superbly otherwise they would have posted a few points against us.

Field in particular in broken field will definitely cause us problems. I agree with you that to take us on down the middle would be foolish.

I’m really looking forward to Saturdays game. If Wigan win (or even lose by a close score) I’ll hold my hands up and say they are a real threat this season. Toulouse game apart (and parts of the Hudds game) they’ve looked good this season so Saturdays game is a good barometer of where they are.

It will be really interesting to see how your pack goes against Catalans. We nullified them for the first game however we’ve got our own great pack anyway so it was fighting fire with fire.

We’re a work in progress I think. I fancy that we can maybe take Catalans on at the minute and go close but there’s still work to do before we face (and try to beat) Saints. I don’t think we’ll be in the trophies this season but you never know. People are just enjoying seeing a bit more threat and attacking intent. When we do meet Saints we’ll need to push things and be inventive but it could make for a good game.

I agree trying to 100% replicate what they do isn't the answer, but we need to look at how we up our intensity at key times and positions on the field and find teh right balance. Especially against Saints you need to stop them coming out of their half as easily in the first 3-4 carries.

A good kicking game (it's been better this season but still more improvement needed) exploiting our pace and increased offloading in attack which we seem to be doing will be a huge improvement on last years rugby. We need to put more doubt into a quick line speeds defence and make it harder for them to rush and close the ball players down.

Any of you guys travel over? If so any useful info? Best hotel, bars etc....

It's interesting to hear people including yourself saying that you don't think we'll be in the trophies. We're among the top 3 or 4 sides in the comp so we're definitely in with a chance otherwise the no.1 ranked team would do the clean sweep every year! And that's before we get to the likes of Sheffield etc winning trophies against all the odds.

Saints might look to have the advantage at the moment but it's a long season. Get French and Havard in and we might move a level up. Saints have been relatively lucky with injuries over the last 3 seasons. There's no guarantees that will continue. Most of all form changes over the course of a season. If we're firing on all cylinders come the end of the season (or Saints aren't for that matter) it could look a whole lot different. Most importantly of all, finals are two horse races. We were shoe-ins to win the GF in 2014, Saints to beat Catalans in the CC similar and we know what happened on those days and many others besides.

The trophies aren't handed out in March.

You make some good points. I agree that injuries play a huge part. If we lost say Walmsley or Lomax or even Dodd, we would be massively affected.

However you’ve not made mention of the fact that I think we have a lot more in us yet. Woolf has alluded to this and as I said earlier we are still to play a first choice full strength team. The spine of Welsby, Lomax and Dodd is only 4 games old so lots of room for improvement still.

I don't even know why we're having the season. They should have just given Saints all the trophies and let the players rest for 12 months.

Not sure why you have felt the need to respond the way you have. I've not for one minute suggested we are going to do a clean sweep, I've just alluded to the fact that injuries could play a part. I was merely saying that I think there is more improvement in us yet.

I thought you welcomed fans from other clubs?