What are people's gripes with O'Brien, other than he isn't Briers?

For someone that clearly has skill with boot to ball his kicking in play really should be much much better. I'd have him practising this skill for most of the week as it is our major failing as everyone can see.

GOB is developing.
I'm not brushing him aside, he has a future here.
He just needs two Sunday dinners a day down him for a month or two with a big weight programme on upper body strength and bigger kicking legs to get some height on them bombs and distance when from deep.

Getting back to R&B, the wheels have not fell the season by any means, but my point was to couple them back together to give us a rock solid foundation at hb and create a winning habit again instead of this trial, error and unstable combinations we are seeing this season that are leading to either very tight wins or losses.

From that solid foundation of R&B we can build team confidence into all areas, from that stability we can then ease GOB back in with little disruption.

I was hoping that we would have brought a dobson type hb in the off season. Ratchford can cover all the back positions but excels at fb.our hb's desperately need sorting.

Assuming that Ratchford and Bridge works as well as you think it will, at what point will you bring O'Brien back in? You're convinced we're going to go an a winning run if Smith agrees with you, so presumably it's going to be rather awkward to break that up and bring O'Brien back in?

There is no doubt in my mind that with R&B at hb we will click instantly. 
We create a winning habit and confidence from which we build.
There will always be opportunities to bring in GOB.

The menace having two big strong guys at hb was the stabling factor.
They both give a presence with their size being bigger than all hbs but perhaps Pryce.
They both have great upper body conditioning and have been able to play as forwards at loose.
They both have a good short kicking game.
But most importantly they both have craft.

My one thing is that his kicking game (out of hand) is very poor, but so is Ratchford's Myler's and Bridge's (can't really judge Wheeler's yet).

Isn't Richie Mylers contract only to 2015. If he is in Tony Smiths future plans I would have thought he would have extended it.

But if they click instantly, and we start ripping up the league, then if O'Brien gets a chance (injury/suspension) you're going to be on here demanding that O'Brien is moved out for Ratchford/Bridge to move back in. That won't necessarily be an unreasonable view to hold, but the reality is that if Smith goes with Ratchford/Bridge then it will be hugely detrimental to O'Brien's career. Again, ultimately, that may be the way things work out. No harm in that. But you can't suggest that taking O'Brien out of the team in the manner you do will be anything other than bad news for O'Brien.

no, but it fits his agenda.

If GOB and Bridge work out with Ratchford at fb then better still.
Sorry FMC.
GOB is always in my plan, R&B may be a short term solution for a 18 month old problem.

What is for sure hb combinations with Myler other than that of Briers haven't been our A game.

OK, Yed.
I can't make my mind up whether this is a gripe or not, BUT.....

I think we are all forgetting, O'Brien is now 23.....yes, that's TWENTY THREE. Not still a "wet behind the ears" 19 year-old.
He's understudied (and learned off) Briers. He's been loaned out to other clubs to get first team experience. (IIRC) He's had training sessions involving Andrew Johns. He's being coached by a GF winner, and we STILL say he's learning/developing. HE'S TWENTY THREE, FFS. He should have learned/developed by now.
At 23 we should have the finished article.

Don't get me wrong, he's a good lad. Is he at the level we need him to be (consistently playing great/MoMs)? I'd say no.

The next 6-18 months are going to be interesting at The Wire, half-backwise

Without wanting to be too harsh on the lad, its just that he's a bit ordinary, isn't he??

If I go through my time following Wire, its fair to say we have had some cracking half backs over the years.... Parry Gordon, Ken Kelly, Andy Gregory, Keith Holden, John Woods, Phil Blake, Greg Mackey, Kelly Shelford, and quite a few more, the list is a pretty long and impressive one.... Unfortunately, O'Brien (and all the others trying to do the job at present, with the possible exception of Ratchford) isn't a patch on any of those.

I accept it isn't only a Wire problem - the quality of half backs in general in the British game is pretty lousy - but seeing the side continue in such a one-dimensional, tedious manner will not be good for the club, not just in the hunt for honours, but in the long term job of getting folk through the turnstiles and actually being able to entertain them with some rugby that people will actually want to watch, rather than endure.

There, ladies and gentlemen, is a very good theory, and possibly, the truth. He is a bit ordinary (too many times)

If there are any Wakefield/Widnes/ both Hull team's fans reading this, then I apologise, but that's the level of club, where GO'B is currently at. He's not playing at the kind of level, for a club that should be challenging for honours, come August and October

Gareth O'Brien reminds me of Rocky Turner. An OK player. Good goal kicker. But not quite good enough.

I'm a great fan of Ratchford's but in my opinion he isn't a half back because he doesn't pass the ball enough although he is great at finding gaps, & as for Bridge ,he tends to get pretty long term injuries at some time during the season so leave him where he is at centre,where he can still do plenty of attacking, & let Myler & O'Brien develop together. They do need to practice their kicking game though.

It would be good to let Myler & O'Brien develop together. But Myler is beginning to become a "Tampax" man.

As long as one of them can partner Cronk effectively next season that'll do.

Ah, come on, he's better than Turner, FFS. He can run at more than 1 mph for a start.

I like O'Brien. I think he has the ability to become a very good player.
I think the turnover of playing staff over the last 16 months has caused problems on the edges.
We had a fairly steady left edge of
Riley, Atkins, Waterhouse and Myler
A right edge of
Monaghan, Bridge, Westwood and Briers.

Now the only player remaining on the left edge is Atkins, When Waterhouse was injured Laithwaite played on that side but Laithwaite is now playing right second row with curie filling in there. Myler has moved to the right edge.

Then on the right edge for the first 4 games this year only Bridge and Monaghan in the Catalan game have played in their standard positions from 2013.
A lot of these changes have been forced by injuries in recent games
We look lost when we shift the ball to either side and I dont think that is all to do with the halfbacks. Some of the lines the runners are making are giving little or no option for the halves.
If we managed to play Westwood at Right second row with Bridge and Monaghan outside then the only change from 2011-2013 is Myler for Briers, At least there would be a bit of understanding on that side.
Laithwaite back with Atkins on the left edge (OK Evans is out for a while) would give a bit of consistency from last year.

If we keep some of the players where they have been playing for a while then there maybe a bit more understanding, I still think we will continue to look clunky when we shift. We have often tipped the ball on pushing the player towards the touchline with nowhere to go.
To me we have the players to do a lot of damage down the middle (See the build up to the try away against Hull or OBriens try late last year away at Cas) now we have Clarke but we don't use this anywhere near as often as we should. We look our most dangerous when we have players like Clarke, Atkins, Russell, Ratchford jumping out of Dummy half or having runners cutting back in behind the markers but I appreciate that Hill, Sims etc need to have done the hard work down the middle first.
I say start with Harrison at LF, Westwood back to Right second row, Laithwaite to left second row and Currie coming off the bench.
None of this solves the kicking game though but I dont think Ratch and O'Brien are as bad in that department as we are making out, I wouldnt let Myler near a kick on the fifth tackle unless it was a kick to the corner for Monaghan.
The halves come up against another set of NRL standard halves this weekend - Should be interesting but I would be concentrating on punching holes behind the marker, at least we would be playing to our strengths.

I can't believe how quick everyone is to judge GOB.

Should he really have hit his peak at 23? Really?

Other than his kicking game being spotty, GOB is great, world class at times in fact. For me, GOB stays in the halves for the foreseeable future.

Kelly Shelford...crikey.....if the internet was around when he was playing.



what an awesome player he was ..........when he could be bothered.........

I'd imagine someone somewhere would sing your just a fat Rangi Chase....

......when he was sober.

Have I told the story that Kelly Shelford used to have to be knocked up every Sunday morning?

Well the club had a copy of his house key never mind knocking him up, it didn't work.
If a player didn't go round his house and pull him out of bed he would sleep right though and miss the game.

One match day they got him out of bed and drove him to the Wilderspool absolutely stinking of alcohol, and obviously still drunk.
He ran out onto the pitch played like he was sober and got man of the Match award.
He returned to the changing room after the match and fell asleep still drunk!

Must admit I haven't made my mind up about Gareth. He produces the odd-flash of brilliance, the try vs St George being a good example, that would send the Myler camp into raptures and thrashing their keyboards at a frenzied rate, but his tactical kicking game is poor and he gets caught in posession too much for my liking.

The Ratchford-Bridge partnership may be worth reviving but if someone has to make way it should be Myler. Sorry folks. If O'Brien is not the finished article at 23, then Myler is way beyond redemption.

As for the hall of fame of Wire half-backs that was mentioned, any one of them could name their salary and walk into any SL starting XIII, let alone Warrington's. There isn't a halfback in the competiion to compare with any of them, so to compare O'Brien (and indeed any half-back) to them is unfair. They belong to a past that valued individual skill over everything else, and I'd trample over my grandma to have any of them (inc. Fatty Arbuckle Shelford) available for selection in the P&B today.

The effect of Rugby Union now paying (and much more than League) cannot be underestimated. A look at the background of some of the top Union backs will show up just how many would be playing League years ago. Just a quick think bring Ford/Farrell/Myler/Eastmond/Burgess to mind and that's just a few of the English players. We used to have the pick of rugby players from round the world but far from it now. There is also lots of young talent who never even think of league because they know where the easier money is.