Hirst drops out, MCB comes in.

Tinirau Arona
Matty Ashurst
Mason Caton-Brown
Anthony England
David Fififta
Liam Finn
Scott Grix
Ryan Hampshire
Justin Horo
Craig Huby
Tom Johnstone
Ben Jones-Bishop
Danny Kirmond
Reece Lyne
Jacob Miller
Pauli Pauli
Tyler Randell
Bill Tupou
Kyle Wood

With Widnes missing their best player in Cahill and having only 2 very average props in their 19 in Burke and Ted Chapelhow, we really should be steamrolling them. This is our chance to gain a bit of confidence and put some points on them.

Good opportunity for Hampshire to start in the halves.

Thought he'd be back in this week but not so sure now. Who gets rested? Woody maybe?

Their squad doesn't look strong and we should be winning this one with some to spare. No guarantees in sport though and it is due to be freezing at kick off

Widnes have some excellent players and should not be underestimated, yes they are missing a few, Gil Dudson always plays well against us and he will be a big miss, bookies have Widnes + 10 - they rarely get it wrong.

We've got plenty of options in the halves and at 9 and Chester has a couple of dilemmas.
Go as strong as possible, with Miller and Finn in the halves and Wood starting 9, with Randall coming on to spell him, which would mean Hampshire missing out or do we give wood and/ or Finn a break ??

It's a tough one and Finn will need a rest at some point in the season.

In years gone by this would be a "4 pointer" but, we appear to be better than that now and perhaps this is a chance for a bit of squad rotation.
It all depends on whether we are looking up the league table and planning for an end of season campaign or, whether we want to secure SL status, with the risk of burnout to certain players later in the season.

I put on the other thread I thought there would be a couple of scores in it, but now the squads are out, and looking at Wakefield -10, I think I'll be lumping on.

Matt Whitley is a quality young English forward, that probably won't be at Widnes for too much longer.

Go on then - name them.

I'm, not underestimating Widnes, they coud easily win, we used t do it often enough - however I see no 'excellent' players in that side. I see some that perhaps once were and some that might be one day but none who are currently 'excellent'.

Please enlighten me as to who they are and then I will tell my Widnes chum because he has no idea which players you are on about.

Hanbury is the only one who comes close in my opinion.

As for us, I’d go as strong as possible. Hampshire will get his chance as the year goes on but the most important thing for me is to get more points on the board at this stage of the season. It’s harsh on Hirst as I thought he went well at Wigan last week but I can’t complain when we get to replace him with Pauli!

I think Inu, who they signed from Catalan is an excellent centre and it was a surprise that he left Les Cats and that Widnes were the "lucky" club.
He was one of Catalan's best player last season, albeit in an under performing side.

A strong powerful runner and Widnes' top try scorer this season.
Reece will need his "A" game to keep him quiet.

Yeah, Hanbury and Inu are the 2 that come to mind as far as real quality. Cahill & Dudson are good players as well and Matt Whitley's been mentioned.

Thought he had a great 2016 but went off a bit last year. back to his best again this year and a real prospect.

I think Belly probably uses `excellent` very loosely. I don`t think Widnes have any players that i would mark up as excellent. Out of the players mentioned Inu has been shown up exactly for what he is over the past few years, he has the ability to be brilliant but is too lazy to show any sort of consistency. Hanbury is a good strike player with some pace behind him but is very inconsistent and defensively nothing to shout about.

For me the closest they have to excellent is Hep Cahill, consistently plays well for them and leads their pack.

He strikes me as a penalty machine though - I have no stats to back that up, but when I've watched them, he seems to get on the wrong side of the ref more often than not.

I'm not sure I understand the 'not Excellent' comments.
With the criteria you are using, how many of ours are 'Excellent'?

That's clearly not the point. I certainly havn't claimed any of our players to be excellent.

Belly states Widnes have a number of excellent players - I dispute that - I don't see what you don't get.

For the record and based on current/recent form we do have a few players who might creep into the excellent bracket at this moment - they are Tupou, BJB, Finn and Arona with Jihnstone and Fifita warming uou - I don't think Widnes have anything comprable at the moment.

Or at least lets hope not because we want those points.

I guess everyone`s benchmark for been excellent is different. It`s down to opinion at the end of the day.

On a similar note the Sky team are guilty of over hyping players constantly.. Paul Cooke was branded "World class" because he threw a decent pass once back in 2005.

I think I've read that Cahill is out tomorrow.

Yep, he is. Big miss for them IMO.

So Vasty your chum at Widnes must agree that Hanbury, Inu, Dudson, Houston, Whitley and Cahill can be regarded as excellent players. I would add Mellor and Gilmore to that list and would describe Mellor as a superb player. Its a joy to watch him play and when you consider the journey he has been on : cut by Wigan, knee surgeries etc then you simply have to admire is determination and rejoice in his success. I would also say that Dean, Olbison, Burke and Marsh are all good SL players.

Correct Belly. Mellor is an extremely talented player and his pairing with Gilmore can cause lots of problems for teams.
Yes, I think Mellor is EXCELLENT regardless of what some winkers feel.
I think it will be a tight game again but of course I hope we put them to the sword.

No he doesn't and he'd laugh hystrically at that list.

Do you actually look at these players or just pick names.

As I said some were once good, Hanbury most notably and some may be one day but some of those simply are not.

Dean. Mellor and Olbison seriously, even for you! As for Huuston I think my mate would actually punch you for that one.

Why not just concentrate on our own players and stop slagging off players like Kirmond and stop trying to mythologise teams like Widnes for hevens sake. We are not a team of superstars so why pretend Widnes are!

We play Cas, Leeds and Saints soon, you can knock yourself out on doomsday scenarios then and your defeatism then but spare us the excellence of Widnes crud, nobody believes that not even people in Widnes.

Anyway you know I'm right and you luv it

So people who don't rate Mellor are winkers. grow up.

So you think this is Mellor do you

Dictionary definition
1.extremely good; outstanding.
"the lorry was in excellent condition"
synonyms: very good, superb, outstanding, magnificent, of high quality, of the highest quality, of the highest standard, exceptional, marvellous, wonderful, sublime, perfect, eminent, pre-eminent, matchless, peerless, supreme, first-rate, first-class, superior, superlative,

27292 posts, people may come to the conclusion you are self opinionated.
meaning
"having and expressing very strong feelings and beliefs, and believing that your own ideas are the only correct ones"

You can say what you like about Vasty, and many do, but he certainly does not opt, unlike so many people in the modern world, to reside in an echo chamber, where he only interacts with people who share his thoughts and opinions.

Maybe it's not that scientific, and he's just an argumentative old git?

Either way, I'd like to make him uncomfortable by agreeing that that list of 'excellent' Widnes players is mostly poppycock; I rate Inu (situationally, because he's lazy) and Hanbury - the rest are, like many of our squad, average SL players, in which case the points of difference are very much around coaching and how the team as a whole out-performs the sum of its parts.