I think Zac deserves his own thread. I wasn’t sure when we signed him & he had a shaky start.

IMO he has grown into a real leader in the team, I’ve been more & more impressed with him as the season has gone on. If you watch him closely he’s often the first to congratulate a try scorer and is very vocal during matches. I hope I’m not jinxing it here but he’s turned into a real asset to the team. KR deserves a lot of credit for mentoring him.

Been dreaming of Zak have you posting at this time?



. Seriously tho I agree with all that you have said . Hes an asset to the team think hes finally found the club to settle down and grow up at which is showing in his desire and passion for the club. Great to see!!

I’m not Nottingham Tiger and spend my nights dreaming about him. The joys of shift work. My normal is a bit different to most peoples.

He’s okay, good full back decent centre.

He’s been overall disappointing for me, not been up to his Leeds or Cas form. Couldn’t provide the X- factor plays last year that are needed at full back in a top team.

If he left this off-season I wouldn’t lose any sleep. I think we could use his salary on a specialist centre.

He’d be better off a mid table team where he could play full back.

We’re stuck with him another 2 years though.

I think that’s pretty harsh to say we’re stuck with him. He will never be that x-factor player again just like Sam Tomkins won’t be either but he offered us something invaluable to the team, which is leadership. I have been lucky enough to be working at some of the no crowd matches and you can constantly hear him leading and directing the team around even from the centres. He’s not the flashy player he once was but he does everything right and has never put a foot wrong on the field. Potentially losing Tommy and Lockers this year or next these attributes will become even more important to the team.

I think he's a bit overrated these days to be honest. I get that he's well liked at the club but I was expecting more of a game breaker based on how good he was at Leeds then Cas. Good to have an experienced pro out there when we're losing a few and I'm glad he's approaching two years since his last off field screw up but he's not someone I'm ready to wax lyrical about.

In our top 3 players week in week out. Player of season last season.

Aye he's e

I agree.

Am I happy that he's here - yes. Do I think there's better centres out there - yes.

Yep, exactly how I feel. Solid performer, particularly the Warrington game a few weeks ago. But I don’t feel we’d miss him if he left.

Good solid pro yes but not what we bought and are probably paying a decent salary to.

Genuinely really surprised at these comments.

Zak’s been one of our most consistent performers week in week out. Is he doing what he did at Leeds/Cas? No but then again he isn’t being played like he was there, especially at Cas when he took up what is French’s role. I’d personally be gutted to see him leave, he’s shown a fantastic attitude in games and out of games and he’s completely turned his career around, proven with an England call up by none other than Shaun Wane who, dependant on who/what you believe, in part left Wigan because of his signing.

He’s a [ipotential[/i captain for me - I’m not calling for it, I want Faz as the next captain with Powell after him.

He’s certainly one of the first names on the team sheet every week.

Hardaker is great for Wigan and Wigan is great for Hardaker!

Surprised at some of these comments too.

I think he has been fantastic this year in the centre. His game is more defensively orientated these days on the right but no issue with that. He is a top performing centre in SL right now in my opinion.

He seems to have developed a real passion for his rugby again and it shows in his displays.

I didn’t want him at Wigan but at the moment he is proving me wrong.

He may not be the flair player he once was but he knows his way to the line and the right side is rarely exposed in defence.

Depending on the retirements we will no doubt be experiencing in the offseason I’d definitely expect him to be in serious contention for a formal leadership position.

Spot on pal!!

Also spot on!!

Do you not think it's a bit soon after all his off field stuff? His last indiscretion that we know of was two years ago, and we've been in partial lockdown for a long period of that.

on the last 3 games hes probably been our best player over the 3

Great player - really pleased he's turned the corner at Wigan.

I can only go off what I see and know and what I see on the field and by the looks of it off it is a natural leader.

Already part of the leadership group which was chosen by the players.

Possibly is but he’s worked hard to turn heads and opinions, as exemplified by jonh who IIRC was vehemently against his signing.

A leadership role is a broad term, he’s ultimately a senior player in the team and the younger players will look to him - and others - for advice and learn from him. He may already inadvertently be in a leadership role, the likes of Hankinson and Bibby could and probably are learning an awful lot from him which can only benefit them both at whichever club they end up at. A leadership role doesn’t necessarily mean in the ‘leadership group’

My view on Hardaker regards playing is that he’s lost pace, so therefore he’s not as dangerous but he’s still a very good player. He’s also playing out of position and he looks to have been learning on the job and he’s got better as time has gone by. I think this time next year we’ll see a much better centre in Hardaker.

As for leadership, he looks a great guy to have around the group and an ideal candidate to be part of a leadership group but unfortunately you could never pin your hopes on him as outright captain. That’s not to say he hasn’t changed but this is a guy on his 5th or 6th chance and his reward for being a reformed character is being part of that leadership team but IMO those previous misdemeanours rule him out of the top job.

Must say from an outsider looking in, from what I have seen of him, I am impressed with a couple of things on Hardaker over the last couple of years: 1. His attitude (I will be the first to admit that I was doubtful that he had changed and I thought Wigan were making a mistake in signing him) I think it is clear for everybody to see (Other than Nottingham Tiger) that Zak has turned his life around and completely changed his attitude - This has to be admired 2. The maturity of his game is there for all to see, he seems to make all the right decisions and he still has the ability to finish his chances, previously it was just 100% ability with some naivety in his game.

In terms of the people wanting a game breaker, lets not forget at Cas, not only was he in a key position at FB to be able to have such a big influence on the game but he was there game breaker, although Gale went well, Zak was there number one threat - At Wigan he seems to be in a more structured set up with multiple attacking threats in the spine in French, Hastings etc so not as much of the reliance is on him to create or be there in support of the opportunities created.

1 thing I don’t get is the perception that he isn’t a centre.

He played all of his junior rugby at centre, made his breakthrough at Fev as a wing then moved to centre and was signed by Leeds as a centre as a long term replacement for Keith Senior.

His first season at Leeds was at centre and he only moved to fullback when the Webb picked up an injury.

When he moved to the NRL with Penrith he played as a wing/centre.

If Webb hadn’t been injured he would never have played fullback. This clearly became a very good position for him and one he made his own but he still has bags of centre experience.

Given his loss of pace the move back to centre was a natural move for him and for me particularly positionally that experience as a centre hasn’t been lost to him.

Barely puts his winger away though.

I really rate the lad and have grown to appreciate what he brings to the team. There is a part of me that's a little disappointed that we didn't get the Cas vintage, but he's a solid 7.5/10 (at least) performer, week in, week out.

One of SL players that when he was at other clubs I felt a tad jealous of him not being at Wigan,so happy he came, yes not in the best of circumstances but he seems settled and is more than a solid performer each week.