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38 pages, for a player who many have said "isn't a centre", so why the fuss?

Because he IS a second row, our best second row!

Hansen is by far our best 2nd rower.


In my opinion of course

I think he was actually out performing Hoffman towards the end of the year, Hansen has become a fantastic player! Joel is definitely in our top two second rowers, I think folk forget how good he was last year.

I don't get why they didn't make every ticket in the house a tenner right up until kick off. Even if the game only broke even or even made a slight loss it would be short term pain for a long term gain.

I think we'd have been looking at 60,000 + (I actually think we could have got close to a full house with that and a bit of marketing) and we could make a statement and move forward. As it looks at the moment the £10 tickets went well but now that offer has gone sales seem to have slowed up (you can easily get plenty of tickets together in dearer areas) and I don't really see them picking up too much.

What would wigans motivation be to let joel leave with 4 years left on his contract?

Its not like we can spend lots of money if we let him anyway..

If we let him go it will show that the club will let any of our players go to RU if they offer us some money, it virtually guarentees sam will following him in 12 months later if not ewarlier and then probably another few

Where is our ambition exactly? I feel there is something IL is not revealing..

maybe Joel wants to play 2nd row for warriors....maybe he never wanted to play centre....maybe he heard IL at fans forum saying Joel would be a great centre after a winters training.....maybe joel thought "hang on..i could earn 5 times the money playing centre in union"

lot of maybes....but might add up to a could be

JT is a much better back rower than he is a centre.

Maybe RU see him as a "battering ram" type of player but maybe they want to train him as a back row forward?

Joel Tomkins - and any other RL player - look after themselves. Just like the club will look after itself. That's sport and it is probably more applicable to RL than any other sport because of how much a player earns. How many years do you get as a first grade RL player? If you reach ten years at the highest level that's considered a success. Not to mention that contracts tend to decline as a player gets older. And then what? Driving taxi's like Graeme West?

A successful club is a happy club. Warrington were quick to boot Martin Gleeson when his motivation was lacking. Hull KR have recently terminated their new signing Misi Taulapapa (who hasn't even played a game for the club yet) because he was unhappy with the coaches plans for 2012.



I don't think this is any more a problem for Wigan as it is the RFL and RL on a much wider scale. Clint Newton raised some serious points about the game in this country and for far too long players have been ignored.

What more could Wigan do? They've given Joel Tomkins a five year deal, openly spoke about ing our future around his brothers and the rest of his mates playing in the team. Union come in offering astronomical wages that Wigan are restricted to combat and the lad is just looking after himself. RL in this country can't offer what RU can. It's every much an issue for the game as it is for Wigan.



Ian Lenagan states our ambitions and intentions in an article in 'The Guardian'. We're looking into poaching Union players from an early age. I'm sceptical, but at least he's doing something rather than sitting back and accepting defeat.

Follwing [url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_union/15275517.stmTHIS[/url example would be a starting point for RL.

For god’s sake, it’s rumoured that JT is leaving to take up a financially better position elsewhere. Given the current state of the country/finances, anyone who chastises him is a moron.

How many of you would turn down more money (under a guaranteed contract) elsewhere at the moment? Im betting none

Sarries probably see him playing a similar role to Sonny Bill Williams...

Wing?

Given they tried to turn a RL prop into a centre, Joel to wing looks positively conservative.

SBW has played the majority of his rugby at inside it's only recently he has been playing on the wing for the All Blacks, I would think Joel's most effective position would be in the as well in Union. Willie Mason is an example of a league prop forward playing in the backs for union just highlights how much slower their game/players are compared to league.

I don't think the loss of JR is much different to Leeds losing Chev Walker or Lee Smith. Leeds got over that Ok.

I wouldn't blame Joel for taking the money what's important is that we understand why, learn from it and move on which is what I think IL is doing.

As for comments about this being payback time for RL I'm having none of it. I am pretty sure that whereas now RU are recruiting players developed in a rigorous programme RL weren't getting the benefit of that from the players we recruited. I don't much care for RU and for me the problem is that the game doesn't allow talent to shine either through its nature or by design. As I say can't blame the lad for taking the money - £400 k to become a t**t is tempting but is he prepared for the inevitable criticism from the likes of Barnes, Guscott and Morris.

Yes I know. I was just joshing.

With regards to Joel, as i've said earlier in this thread, I see him as an outside centre. He's potentially a better player than Tindall and would fit naturally into that role.

Thinking about it, I think he would fail in Rugby Union, sure he might earn a decent wedge and get the promised England cap but I don't think he runs hard enough anymore, in 2010 he did do, early in the year he was average at 2nd row and wasn't running or tackling hard enough. Once shifted to the centres he did a steady job and helped us out but I don't think he would be effective at centre in RU, his attacking game consists of running his winger out of space and one hand flicking it back inside to Charnley, IMO RU centres have to have the ability to do a few crash balls back into the ruck area from time to time and I don't think he has the aggression and doesn't run hard enough to do so, he would do well in defence as all RL players do as we have the sliding defence engraved into our mindset.

For an RL player to do well at Union they need to have the strength of mind to ignore the critics, the intelligence to learn the game and all it's rules and the hunger and heart to suceed as your looking at 2 years of learning the game in order to do what your capable of, you had the freakish talent in Robinson but who else has took to RU in less than 2 years, most come back to RL a shadow of the player they were

I don't think Joel would make it in RU and needs to make his mind up asap as he will be going down in the estimations of all the Wigan fans. On another note I think Sam might do well in RU at fullback.

Seeing that he only started 2 games in the pack in 2011, I would suggest that your criticism is unfounded.

Think he started 4 at 2nd row but only finished one game there (Saints in Cardiff?)

What it shows is how much Gleeson was a major loss to Wigan.

Joel wouldn't have played so much at centre. He wouldn't have scored that try at Wembley and as such wouldn't have seemed such an attraction to Rugby Union Clubs.

Great post!

The loss of Gleeson was the worst knock we got last year by a long way...

Agreed, he was fantastic in 2010. I think we still miss Piggy too, but that's a different matter altogether!

Gleeson currently has no club and we need a new .........