Well point taken but the fact remains that the smaller the crowd the more impact on Leigh's salary cap for next season.

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THEY,VE NOT DONE US A FAVOUR !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I. Millward and the lads would have learned a lot more playing against international class players than young lads, like the Wire game highlighted a problem on the right side
our forwards would have learned hell of a lot by playing against the Wire pack, no your wrong
we would have learned hell of a lot more playing a proper Wigan side than a team of young Wigginers,,,,

Totally agree.

I don't really see why we should have been getting a share in the first place. It's good of teams like Leigh, Wakefield and Wire to accomodate our pre season games at their stadiums because we wouldn't have anywhere to play them otherwise.

Are you saying that the DW stadium is only available to Wigan Wariors for games that have some meaning to their season and not for friendlies? Dear me and I thought we had a bad relationship with our landlords.

If your going then GO if not then DON'T no use moaning about it, its out of our control just enjoy the occasion or not, its purely a matter of choice, the Leigh management are not happy but its a typical SL club decision but one we should have expected, Saints have done a similiar thing (in fact even worse as it was one of their own ex players benefit games), every dog has its day ours will come.

Shame you spoilt your reply with the last paragraph.

Teams outside Non Relegation league have few opportunities to increase income.They get little help from Sky and not much from the RFL.

You need to realise with 12 professional clubs in the heartland of the game it would not endure as a professional sport. Most clubs outside Non Relegation league are hanging on a thread and franchising has increased the pressure on the survival of the professional game and once that is gone how long before there is only kick and clap ?

Yeah we would of learned.......... of more injury's probably. I think the right thing is being done given all our circumstances

Yep, Warrington game is Paul Wood's testimonial

Yep.

The Stadium won't be used by Wigan Warriors for pre season friendlies and never has been apart from the odd special case for a testimonial. To be fair Latics don't really have any home pre season games either. They normally go on tour then have local away friendlies and possibly just one home game a week before the premiership kicks off.

I prefare going away from friendlies anyway. A 25,000 seater stadium with 3-4,000 doesn't create the best atmosphere.

your not wrong there mate.on another note that shirt looks like an old leigh shirt with a wigan badge on it

Absolutely definitely a shared gate, last season - 50/50, after expenses. I suppose the W***n hierarchy will be getting a decent fee from the Wire game, testimonial or not!

For the sake of seeing some rugby, I'm looking forward to this as I missed the Wire game.

The club/LSV need to be a bit careful next season though because its hard enough to get many townsfolk to pay £14 for anything, let alone watching SL reserves.

Nothing unexpected there from a fans point of view I think most fans would feel exactly the same. What is disgusting is the agreement that wigan made with Leigh about playing so many games vs each other promising big crowds turning up to watch both full teams. Regardless of most of us without rose tinted spectacles on knowing we would probably get beaten , fans won't pay £14 to watch Leigh play a reserve team or U21's team so both sets of fans numbers will be considerably less now thanks to the team changes .

That was because Warrington wanted to play Wigan for Paul Woods testimonial. Warringon had already agreed to play Leigh last week.
The week before that they were in Tenerife warm weather training. There wasn't a lot more dates available, given that Wigan had also arranged friendlies v Saints and Wakefield.

thing is though Steve the LSV charge the same no matter who the opposition is so its a catch 22 situation, these games are needed (trial/friendlies games) and if we played say Oldham (no disrespect to them) they would only bring along the same (perhaps even less) speccies than Wigan will, so whats the answer play them at a great financial loss? dont play them at all? play them away?
These games are vital for the coaches plans, the players want paying, should we expect AT or any other director to finance everything?
Wigan have renaged on the agreement so should it now be ripped up? I think so, but who do we arrange to play? and can we be assured they wont do the same?
Lets face it £14 is expensive at any time but until the games management and players realise, that unless they start to accept that they are going to ruin the game and that they are not going to have a game to manage, coach and play at semipro (and even pro) level. Even at £14 a game clubs are not making any money and anyone who thinks they arte really do need a financial lesson.
But until club management all get together and stop this going for broke attitude then costs will still spiral out of control.
We all like to see a winning team out on the paddock but this costs money so who should pay?

I'm of the opinion we should keep the fixture for next season , yes it will be perhaps a little lacking because of the team being sent , but as has been posted W1g4ns main concern will be preparation for their season , unfortunatley that is just the way it is

What was disapointing was the turnout by the people of Leigh last season given the timing of the opening of the stadium

We need to play games against big local rivals to help revenue and hopefully entice potential new fans to the LSV , sometimes it will happen , sometimes it wont

We cannot afford to spit the dummy out over this , we are the beggars , not the choosers

It will be o good game of that I have no doubt , so for anybody deciding they dont want to go fine , but dont ask me afterwards what the score was or how we played , the opportunity to see for yourself is there

Maybe it would be better for both clubs not to announce the squads for the games untill the day of the match. It's only a little white lie. I dont know whats been said in the local press about this fixture and the squads but I bet there are a lot of people who don't come on here or Wigans forum that aren't aware of the squads and will turn up because it is Leigh vs Wigan.
Come On You Leeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeigh.

I'm still going anyway - and looking forward to it. I just think they're showing us a massive disrespect and if Ian Leneghan bothers to turn up, I'll tell him so. Last year he was bleating on about how Wigan and Leigh were now best friends off the field and they (as a club) will do as much as they can to help us.

Empty words and empty promises I'm afraid.

Like I said before their game against Warrington is a testimonial surely that has less importance than this game.
Thats usually where past players dust off there boots and a bit of fun is had, like when we played Saints and TM and Chris Joint came on. Don't understand it but hey ho I'm being driven to the game on sunday so at least I can have a pint.

Maybe we could swap our current kits and just change the sponsors and club badges. Our kit is pretty poor tbh and yours looks a belter.

Charity begins at home Mish , if you were McGuire you would want to call the shots as far as playing decisions were concerned

Apart from Mike Gregory , who was the last W1g4n coach not to get fired ?

McGuire will probably have 2, poss 3 years to win SL or he too will get the bullet , in recent years W1gan have started slowly and that has cost them in the end

What this does still prove is that it is still a sport above a business , which is a good thing

I think you'll get a decent number of Wigan fans(especially the old timers) who'll turn up not knowing the teams. Some will have just heard about the fixture via papers or friends and will turn up expecting a full side.

I can hear the humming sound of Wiganers whinging from behind the posts already

Brian Noble

Maguire will get plenty of time because he's Lenagans own choice. He is a far more patient man then Lindsay or Whelan ever were.

Slightly different scenario , but still the same result , he was not retained because he hasn't won anything

He retained him for 2009 on a new 1 year deal which the other lot wouldn't have done and that was even though him and Noble weren't meant to be getting on.

I thought he showed Noble quite abit of patence to be fair considering he couldn't quite get us over the line in a semi, the quality of rugby was poor and alot of our players were totally unfit(something thats been fixed already by Maguire).

Maguire has a 3 year contract and i'm pretty certain he'll be around for all of that under Lenagan.