Sorry, you'll have to speak up. I couldn't hear you over the noise of someone emptying our trophy cabinet to give them another polish.

A terrible joke Andrew.

1. I didn't speak, there wasn't any audio for you to hear. It's an internet message board, things are written down and read.
2. You're implying that if the cabinet wasn't being emptied that you'd be able to 'hear' me. I'm not sure if my voice could carry from a few miles away, even without taking into account traffic and other noise. Or, you're implying that we're both stood lurking by the cabinet at Headingley? Not sure.
3. You'd hope that the person charged with polishing the trophies would be more careful with them when getting them out to polish, particularly the Challenge Cup. What did they do, tip the cabinet up to get the trophies out?
4. If I was speaking that sentence, and I could see someone in the background was in the process of starting to empty the trophy cabinet without due care and attention, I'd help communication by making the action of a 'V' at you.
5. No need to apologise.

Couldn't give a $hit! As has been pointed out we've had plenty more to shout about than you lot since then.

It just highlights what a total snivelling turd he is.

If Bailey or Hardaker or Hock or Wilkin did that to you lot there would be threads 100's of pages long.

Too right , things have moved on in the British game , he is yesterday's man . Arguably the best talent around when he left , now i am not sure he is the best player at Wigan .

What...? Who is, then?

Got to be Tony Clubb - for his game-breaking high balls.

After that Tony Clubb kick they throw in the towel

That is quite possibly the worst Hail-Mary of all time!

Opossed to Mcguires against Shudds! Which is as good as any you will see.

You're quite right. I would have kept Hampshire and left Tomkins to go elsewhere.

As a Cas fan it's a win-win situation.

Totally.

Like when Wigan lauded the return of Joel [delCantona[/del Tomkins.

Has done little since he returned and smacked of sheer sentimentality.

I like his beard. Very jealous of that. When I let mine grow that long it just goes curly and I look like someone has glued a poodle to my face.

He's going to miss the start of the season too (6 weeks) also a knee injury.

An intensely irritating interview with England's no.2 full-back has appeared on the BBC website, if you need a reminder what an opportunistic little turd he is...

[urlhttp://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-league/35473969[/url

I would happily swap his table salt for Warfirin.

What is actually offensive about the article?

He hasn't wasted any time has he



Wonder if he's already sent Bennett a basket of muffins and planning on giving him an apple on the first day of training.

"Please pick me over Zak Sir!"

He might want to think about getting on the pitch for wigan and justifying his signing before he tries to take a spot Zak earned .

Tbf though if Bennett continues with England playing like Aussie's then most of the team will be from Wigan anyway.

One thing about Bennett and England is that there's not a single player who he'd be worried about dropping. He's coached all-time greats on a regular basis, so would hardly be worried if the likes of Tomkins (or Burgess) got peeved at being dropped.

In essence it's a choice between a FB who is defensively strong and links in attack or one who offers the more creative attacking options.
It's really going to be down to what options you have in the halves. If you choose less creative halves you have to make up for it somewhere else, and that would be FB these days (loose forwards are just extra props these days). England had no creativity in the halves against NZ and we looked boring and struggled to move the ball or create any space. If you had the same halves then I can't see any other option than having Tomkins at FB. It plainly didn't work for Zac (or any of the outside backs) going forward the way England set up.
However, if you add Sam and George Burgess up the middle and, dare I say Cuthbertson, then you have the threat up the middle of an offloading game sucking in wider defenders and delaying the defensive line getting set (something we spectacularly failed to do against NZ) then you create a much better structure for a classical linking fullback like Hardaker to free up the rest of the backs - who are very, very good.

Going to be interesting.

I'm as happy as anyone to slag the little turd off, but I'm struggling to see anything in that article to criticise him over.

As DHM says, the lack of creativity in the halves may necessitate Tomkins rather than Hardaker at full back.
Hardakers defence is superb but even for Leeds he was often struggling to effectively fit in to our attack. That is obviously highlighted more so for England where you're not as familiar with the other players. Hopefully he'll improve his ability to link into an attacking line/move, if he does he'll have pretty much everything.

It seems to me it depends on whether you want your full-back to be able to defend. Zak is better in the air (crucial it seems to me when the sides down under rely so much upon bombs in attack) & is a better one on one tackler than ST.
If fit I think both will play, ST will be FB in attack & Zk will be FB when defending.

Bennett will be more familiar with the terrible NRL version of Tomkins than the exciting, pre-crocked Super League version.

That said, if Tomkins does recover some fitness or form then perhaps Bennett will move him up to the halves as he's done with a similar attacking talent - Milford - at the Broncos.

He's an intensely irritating individual but I don't read anything in there other than a player wanting to remind Bennett in particular that he is still out there. Bennett's appointment should have a positive effect on elite players, making them more likely to want to be part of the set up & less likely to take their skills elsewhere.