1st

Yeah i'm going with that, why not

2018 - 3rd best defence
2019 - 2nd
2020 - 2nd

Don’t get me wrong. I think we’ve underachieved and with some more creativity attack wise could have two or three more trophies. I just think we shouldn’t think we have a right to be successful and the fact we have challenged every year shouldn’t be discounted.

Unfortunately I can't see past Wigan and Saints but the early confirmation of Price's departure might even help galvanise the team rather than living under a cloud of rumour and conjecture.

1 Wigan
2 St Helens
3 Hull FC
4 Warrington
5 Huddersfield
6 Leeds
7 Catalans
8 Castleford
9 Wakefield
10 Salford
11 Leigh
12 Hull KR

Fair enough, I didn't expect that to be fair I suppose it shouldn't be that surprising when it was painfully obvious that attack was not the priority on the training field.

We don't have an automatic right to win trophies you're right and it's something I'm always conscious of, but I can't agree that we challenged in 2019 and 2020 with the playoff performances we put in. Add to that the cup semi final last year as well. Steve Price did make 3 of the first 4 finals that we had the opportunity to be in, winning 1 challenge Cup which is very good coming from the middle 8s. Since that final though I don't think we have challenged at all on any front and that result and performance was a shock because for me we had been poor in the build up to that challenge cup final as well.

Disappointed in you RD LLS WINNERS, CC WINNERS,GF WINNERS minimum, but I’m hoping for more.

As of now I think we've done quite well under Price. The frustrations are more that we have hit a clear plateau. He hasn't been a bad coach and there is always risk in moving on to someone else that we get worse rather than better. He's ranked second for me in Wire coaches of my time as a fan:

1 Smith
2 Price
3 Johnson
4 Cullen
5 Van de Velde
6 Dorahy
7 Lowes
8 Anderson/Plange

It would be interesting to know the win %, points for, points against stats etc for each of our coaches.

I think Paul Darbyshire would be top of that era for me. God bless him.

Must be of a similar age although I do remember some of the Tony Barrow years

We will not be 7th...or should I say, we will not be 7th with Price running the bridge.

I can beat that. Ernie Ashcoft (who?) was the coach when I first started watching the Wire.

Me too. Although I may have been taken earlier, but will never know.

We'll finish top 4.

Based on trophies won, I can see Price being second however I would have Johnson and Cullen above Price. I just enjoyed the rugby much more under those two coaches. Maybe nostalgia is getting to me with Johnson for that nearly season. Being young, listening to the Fletcher Street End. Even under Cullen we played some really entertaining matches along with some tosh. However under Price its dour and boring. It is literally 5 drives and a bomb for Toby King.....that is all we do!

I always got the impression with Price that he was happy for the team to be allowed to play as long as they can defend. We would have a decent run of form and then have a game or two when we would leak some tries, have some brain explosions and then the games after that was "right, you have shown me you can't defend so we are now gonna go with a Conservative game plan and play percentage rugby"
When that happened the wheels came completely off in 2019 and 2020
At the start of last season even in defeat at Wigan we were offloading for fun and lots of players supporting breaks. After the first lockdown we came out of the blocks fine until a few dodgy results and then the shutters come up.
Even though it was conservative percentage rugby that won the challenge cup in 2019 it is like the players were reluctant to buy into it all the time and there was a conflict of what the coach wanted and what the players wanted to do.
Price has not got a lot to lose now. NRL clubs are not nocking his door down to speak to him and he knows he is off at the end of the year so in theory he could take a step back and just provide overall management, making sure training and prep is all in place and let the assistant coaches earn their money and see what happens.
It might be a better environment knowing that the pressure is off as the future is decided.
On the other hand you could have a complete breakdown of relationship.
We will soon find out

The style of rugby was definitely better under Cullen. We probably took this for granted at the time and were occupied with frustrations over the inconsistency, but Cullen did have a philosophy about playing attacking rugby and everything about the recruitment and wanting the HJ to be a wider pitch etc came from that.

With Johnson it was a bit more mixed. There were a couple of years under Johnson where we were a workmanlike team similar to how we are under Price. But when he got Davies and Bateman; and had the trio of Mackey, Ellis and Shelford, we played some great stuff.

I couldn't see a Johnson or Cullen Wire team winning that Challenge Cup final against Saints though.

Not even with the Saints cup match hoodoo when it comes to the Wire?

You can't beat a good hoodoo

Remember us winning at Saints in the Regal Trophy under Brian Johnson https://www.rugbyleagueproject.org/comp ... mmary.html But Saints then weren't the force they are now, they ended 8th that season (with Sheffield Eagles and Halifax above them) and we almost won the title.

Remember us winning at Saints in the Regal Trophy under Brian Johnson https://www.rugbyleagueproject.org/comp ... mmary.html But Saints then weren't the force they are now, they ended 8th that season (with Sheffield Eagles and Halifax above them) and we almost won the title.

Perhaps I should be more balanced and reflect the fact that the Saints teams that Cullen faced were better than the ones Price faced, so perhaps Cullen's team could have beaten them.

I think Cullen, while he came at the most crucial time for the club, came at the wrong time for him personally. The culture in the club had been a holiday camp, and in honesty, we recruited players on the back of that.

Players like Sculthorpe, Harris, Penny, Roper etc. in the early 90’s displayed huge promise, but those that got sucked into the culture never kicked on. They were talented enough on their day, but more often than not cut corners. Supplemented by those on the way out of bigger clubs or overseas imports who were joining for a payday with a good social life, we were on a hiding to nothing.

That was embedded from the mid 90’s (probably earlier) through to Tony Smith having ‘that discussion’ with Briers and Gleeson.

Cullen could get a response from a team, and could get the team to score points, although they lacked that resolve and discipline required to stop the scoreboard ticking at the other end. If he would have followed Smith in, he may have been our Shaun Wane. Who, realistically, followed McGuires blueprint with a local accent.

If it takes 6 games...Price won’t see the 7th.

Indeed, anyone who lived in South Warrington at the time was quite familiar with seeing certain players in Stockton Heath's pubs and wine bars - a little too much.