How about the 3 late shoulder charges on Widnes players after they had kicked the ball? One of which caused Brown to have to leave the field.

Each of the incidents was a combination of both a late tackle and shoulder charge, went unpunished, each could have been a red card as should have been Smith for his kicking out which was a deliberate foul action.

Anyone watching this game could be forgiven for believing that Wigan are a thuggish side aided and abetted by dreadful refereeing.

I agree with your sentiment but we won our opening game in 2013, hammering Salford 42-0

My bad, but we do have an awful "first up" record

Does make you wonder what we keep doing wrong year-in-year-out. We've lost more opening games than won for the last 10 years or so.
(and Giants will not in be a good mood on Friday after today's run-out either)

When Wane took over from Madge he said he was going to cut out performances like that v Widnes as he felt we lost too many winnable games. I know we didn't lose the game but its exactly the kind of performance he was on about. And there have been several such games ever since Wane has been in charge, notably one against Widnes a couple of seasons ago and one at home to a very poor Bradford side as examples.

I don't think some slow start syndrome cuts it as an excuse when the coach says he wants to eradicate performances like that. In the Widnes game he had a half time team talk to sort the tactics out v 12 men but you wouldn't have thought so given the way the team played.

To be honest I'm pretty sure all top teams still give up shock losses. It's good that Wane has those aims but I do struggle with his arrogance sometimes. Regardless of their respective trophy hauls I wouldn't put him level with Maguire.