Claire Baldings assertion that the Pie Loyal 18 flag represents their 18 CC wins

It actually represents how many fans are usually there at the 79th minute when they're losing.

I actually thought this thread was going to be about the North Stand being closed for a wedding, yet another great advert on national TV. Still hilarious though.

You been drinking Wire200. She made an educated guess and then quickly remidied her mistake. She never claims to know everything about rugby league and is eager to learn. The only cringe in this thread is towards you and your idiocy for starting it. Got to ask, do you cringe when kids say swimmed and don't know how to pronounce ph sounds?

Gormless bully.

I remember a few months ago some goon claiming that the Wigan/Saints game is the only true derby as the 12th Earl of Derby gave his name to the horse race and that fixture, Clare also spouted this little 'fact'. Maybe it's true but if so then the 12th Earl of Derby (the Epsom Derby is named after him) must have had some crystal ball. He died in 1834, 38 years before Wigan were formed and 39 before Saints.

-claire balding eager to learn

shes an absolute joke!!!!!!! p-c at the beeb gone mad!she knows nothing about our great game

and her trying to act * excited* by rugby league is* gringeworthy* to say the least,the sooner they stick her back to covering three day eventing the better,you can write on a pinhead her so called knowledge about rugby league!its an insult to rugby fans to have too sit through her drivel,hence i have to turn the sound off my tv whenever shes on!

You been drinking son?

What a load of rubbish

any way back to the rugby...cant see saints contesting the grand final which is just as well should that team fluke there way there they would be looking at loss number 6...as for wigan they seem to be hitting the straps..will take a good team to stop them reaching wembley again...

Just hope (if you guys win tomorrow) we don't draw you in the semi. It's about time Wigan v Wire was a final!

you have your opinion, wire 200 has his,and i have mine ,end of ,shock:

You know its been a bad day at the office when Brett Finch out runs your defence, as for the game itself Wigan were marginally more composed and thats what probably got them home.

The game was error ridden from start to finish, an on song Catalan or Leeds would have beaten either of those 2 today, i would have included us in that but were far from being on song at the min.

The only cringeworthy thing is this thread, wireflyer's posts at least. Braindead.

So you have to know every single rule and the history of every club and understand what every single one of Wigans million flags mean?

I think our attendance will drop for our next home game if that's the case.

much as i would love to reply to some comments,i have a shed a i have only just just painted and i need to go and watch it dry

Totaly agree.If it's not Eddie,Stevo or Clarkey it's now Clare Balding.If you follow her on Twitter you'd know that she does love RL + yes as JD says she's never claimed to be an expert at the game but is learning all the time.I for one hope she keeps presenting it for as long as the Bbc has the Challenge cup.

She is great for the sport. She is no RL encyclopaedia but what does it matter, she presents professionally and leaves it to the rest to talk the rugby. As far as I am concerned she is one of the main faces of sport in our country, if people are channel hopping and see her they are more likely to tune in. The fact that she talks about RL on her twitter does the sport a world of good too.

BTW, did anyone catch her radio four doccumentary a few months back on the 1895 schism? Fantastic.

Serious question: did James Roby play today...there was somebody on the pitch wearing his shirt but it seemed to be a second rater who had no impact in the game what so ever. I can only imagine Saints brought in a cheap imitation of the world beater?

To be fair, when Roby gets the quick PTBs, he is virtually unstoppable. But when he comes up against a team that can control it and slow it down, he's just an average hooker. I've never seen him change a game to be honest and he had no impact at all, even with all the possession Saints had in our 10.

Roby went well for the first 10 minutes when the Wigan defence was a bit slow around the ptb and the Saints Props were making inroads. After the first Wigan try the Saints go forward went! Laffranchi and Perry just seemed to completely give up at this point. Lance Hohaia was unbelievably slow and predictable at stand-off, and any defence that can't catch Brett Finch must be slow.

Two things:

1. Claire Balding seems like a nice lady and has an obvious soft spot for the game, though despite it being no fault of her own there's no denying she can sound cringeworthy at times.

2. James Roby is not an average hooker, one of the best in the world in fact.

If Roby's average most of the other 9's shouldn't even be taking the field. If you haven't seen him change a game you can't watch anything but your side. Of course though if he wore the cherry and white he would be the best in the world.

At the risk of going over old ground, it's not Ms Balding who's an embarrassment, it's Ray French, whose coverage does the game no favours at all.

Here's just three Frenchisms (of many) that spring to mind from yesterday:-

Calling Chris Hill "Scott" Hill.
Calling Paul Wood "Tyrone McCarthy" ( how anyone can be mistaken for Tyrone is beyond me).
Calling Simon Grix "Micky Higham"

Claire's fine in my book, it's this old duffer that needs to be put out to grass.

there have been many idiotic ramblings on here over the past few months but this tops the lot!!

Sad to see the criticism of Clare Balding by the OP.

It's also sad that this season could potentially be her last fronting the BBC's Rugby League Coverage, with it now the most well known secrety in horse racing that Channel 4 are going to pay megabucks to have her front their coverage.

Hope she can somehow negotiate to be able to still do the RL coverage.