There has to be some question marks around decisions about players being fit to return.

1 - It was clear Burgess was brought back too early last year
2 - The club admitted they probably played French too soon after his return from Aus and likely caused his injury
3 - Field - Although he did his hamstring, he had recently had a back injury - brought back too soon?
4 - Gildart - Didn't look fit / ready in a lot of games did he (could be attitude issue though)

In fairness to the club, it looks like they got things right with Marshall..

On 2 and 3 you’d like to think the club will learn lessons about giving players extended breaks at home, even in an off season that was the longest in my memory. Those two guys mentioned were rushed back because of knock on effects of the extra time at home for Hastings and French. They played Field without a proper pre season because French and Hastings weren’t back (well available in Hastings case as he was just back) and then played French too early because they’d lost another option in Field himself.

The club needs to do the right thing by it’s players but sometimes it needs to do the right thing by itself. If an extra few weeks at home wasn’t enough, they should’ve been looking to offer a mutual termination IMO and that should be the stance going forward. I don’t think that’s harsh tbh. If you can work out a middle ground than great but it went to far for me and we paid the price.

'
The fact that last seasons squad was lower in numbers together with injuries, especially key players and the above average number of suspentions might explain you claim!


Lenagan has said that the club will only be signing one more player when the squad is stll only around the same low number of last season. Up to now, only three players have been confimed as new signings with one unconfirmed, but five players in Bullock, Clarke, Clubb, Gildart, Hastings and Kilner have left the squad.

Add to that a leading player who appears to be discontented because of travel problems, one not been confirmed that he will return from Australia, one who has been on a long term loan with no confrmation of his future at the club and a signing of last season who has yet to prove that he has been a good signing and not injury proned.

As it is intended to re-introduced the Reserves next season, either more experienced players from outside the club will be needed to bring the squad back up to the normal thirty odd players or because of the financial situation, more than usual promoted from the Academy.

The club have made it clear to whre it stands in regard to the new coaching set up, but now they need to make it clear what they intend to about the strength and numbers of the playing staff and not keep supporters in the dark like they have in the past few weeks.


The bookies appear to be showing the same concerns as they have Wigan as fourth favourites to win the the competitions behind St Helens, Catalan Dragons and even Warrington Wolves.

Not sure that explains why we played a SR/LF at centre and hooker when we had a centre and hooker available, or why we played a winger at FB and a FB on the wing.

His team selections were baffling at best.

I agree with you on some selections, but don't forget he had three assistants to whom he could consult, one of whom was the ex. club captain

Like no doubt Peet will do with Briers and O'Loughlin.

Its called a coaching team!

But ultimately the HEAD COACH picks the team.

Exactly, but still like any head coach or manager consults his Assistants on how they have been training, carrying any injuries etc.

And can choose to completely ignore them if he wishes to do so, which he did.

Due to cap constraints, any team who wants to win SL HAS to have a decent mix of academy products and players from outside the club.

Not only that, the quality of these academy players has to be excellent.

Given how successful wigan are at academy level, questions need to be asked as to why they dont have more, very good SL quality players in their team?

I mean look at Tom Davies. Before his injury he was averaging what, 150m a game? You got rid of him because you had Burgess, Marshall and Manfredi but then also ended up signing Bibby? This was after handing him a 5 year contract as quite rightly, you had massive hopes for him but just cast him aside due to his injury.

Do you know this for a fact? Lam ignoring advice of his assistants?

You need to get your facts straight.

Tom chose to leave as he wasn't guaranteed 1st team rugby.

With regards to signing Bibby. Its all in hindsight and he may have been signed predominantly as a Centre? We still don't really know because of injuries.

I agree Davies staying would have been best, but its all in hindsight.

Steph has an ability to see in to the future obviously. He knew Burgess would suffer with injuries and a loss of form and he knew Manfredi would need to retire (in fairness, he probably did know that one).

Tom Davies has done the right thing for his career and fair play to him. I’ve always felt he has a couple of weak points that hold him back from being very top class, like a Makinson for example but he’s an absolute workaholic and has grafted his way to being one of the better wingers in the league.

They alluded to it at the forum with him selecting multiple players who weren't fit.

Can you paste the exerts from the transcript on this one...

What did your last slave die of?

The fact only 3 years ago our Grand Final side had 0 Australians, just Tommy and 2 french lads and now we are scrambling over quota spots just shows the mismanagement.

Absolutely.

The signing of Field seemed unnecessary at the time and as though it had been done because they expected one of French or Hastings to leave. We now probably do need him but we then sign Leuluai up to a new deal, which just seems bonkers. I like Isa and wanted to sign him back up but if they had planned to keep Leuluai on, you’d have probably understood if they’d have parted ways, especially given how many good young backrowers we have and Farrell and Bateman cover the need for experience. We sign a quota wingman from the Championship, who has no real top flight history down inder. Now I like the looks of the guy and I think he could go really well but getting a homegrown winger would seem easier than getting a homegrown halfback, so again you could live without that signing.

Those three moves have tied our hands. We could only afford to make two of them IMO.

Who alluded to it?

The club or supporters.

He picked players that weren't fit. Do you think he listened to his support staff (analysts, physios, coaches etc) when making those selections?

I may be putting 2 and 2 together and getting 5, but seeing as he demanded a signing (Sammut) and then didn't pick him I'm pretty confident in my maths skills.

Yeah the idea that Sammut was Lam's choice seems odd, given that, whatever you think about him, the fact is that he wasn't given much of a shot at Wigan.

There are two mentions of injuries, are there others you are referring to? What they do not definitely say is that Lam acted against advice, it could simply be a viewpoint in hindsight.

French
[iWhat that did do it meant that he came into the season completely underprepared to be brutally honest. He needed a good five or six weeks of more pre-season training and him to get his body right to play. So that’s a reflection of something that I believe we could have done better. I think he was probably selected a little bit early, four or five more weeks, and we might have been in a different position. [/i

Burgess
They only mentioned him turning up overweight, working him too hard in pre-season.

As I said above, may be me getting 5 from 2+2 but if a player isn't fit and we know he isn't fit then someone somewhere within the coaching setup will have said something.

Seeing that compared to a normal season, the squad was light in numbers with some players on long term injuries and one or more suspended, there may have been times when the odd player or so was carrying a knock and not fully fit.

I seem to recalled that on one occasion, the club could only announce a pre match squad of only nineteen players instead of the normal twenty one.

The fact that twenty five games were completed is a credit to the club and the coaching team headed by Lam even if the results were not good enough.