Oh dear Oh dear...

dummy sptting of the highest order

It's our worst start to a season since 1900-01!






Noble must go.

The team are unfit, have no idea in attack and are shocking in defence. There are too many players that are liabilities and are pinching a living at our club...yet our coach fails to drop them.

You have to seriously question what the hell they do in training, because on match day they play like a bunch of strangers rather than a team.

Noble was successful at Bradford by having a huge team that beat the opposition into submission - Rugby League has moved on since then and his one-dimensional style of play, in addition to being boring, has failed miserably.

It was interesting watching how Saints simply upped the tempo of the game when we took the lead against them last Thursday - we are not capable of doing that, since our side lacks pace. During the 80s and 90s, Wigan had a Sprint Coach (Bill Hartley being one of them) - the current team don't do track work as part of their training.

I've previously posted elsewhere on this site that we need a complete overhaul of our coaching set-up - there is an over-reliance on former forwards, none of whom were 'flair' players. We need a better balance of high quality, qualified coaches.

A worrying thing is how youngsters at Wigan develop year on year via the U18s and U21s, but their development stops when they reach the first team - we need to urgently address this.

Taxi for Noble

So why did Noble sign a centre (Gleeson) and a winger (Roberts)?

He should have ignored Riddell and Roberts, shifted TL to 9 to play with McIlorum and signed a 7 and a prop.

Noble to move upstairs in Director of Rugby role and Wane to be given the coaching role until the end of the season would be ideal scenario

Noble is Rugby League through and through, which is why I find some of the comments on this thread despicable, however it is clear for whatever reason that he is unable to coach this current side. And for that reason, a change must be made.

I would say you need Farrell in in some capacity to dish out a few bollockings. Kept you guys going for years towards the end of his time with you just through sheer leadership IMO. I've said for a few years now that if Farrell was captain still he wouldn't let your players get away with some of the rubbish you see

I think we are all over reacting. I don't rate Noble as the right coach for Wigan, and think that we should seriously look for a new one at the end of the season. I am not a happy camper, and have on a number of times questioned why I keep renewing my season tickets. However after thinking about this, my own view is we should stick with Brian Noble until the end of the season.

I think Mr. Lenagan should:

1.) Be clear about his expectations - that Wigan needs to seriously improve and that Brian's job is definitely on the line.

2.) Insist that we immediately bring in a specialist coach to sort out our attack - tactics and creativity - Noble is weak, boring and old fashioned in his thinking in this area.

3.) Insist that we appoint a new captain, who will be vocal on the field and read the riot act to the players, when they perform poorly or lack any intensity.

4.) Tell Brian to get the fitness levels sorted - they looked really poor against Cats.

5.) Do what he can within the cap to strengthen our position at prop, and let our current group of Props know that they are playing for survival on a Wigan team - that at the end of the year there will be a clear out.

I understand the "we have nothing to lose" and the caretaker comments, but I don't think the season is a total write off, and I think the disruption will just take us backwards. Unless you have a really good coach in mind, I can't see that firing Brian Noble will sort any issues out.

Despite all the doom and gloom that everybody is venting, I think we do show signs of being a good team. The game against Saints and even against Cats, shows that our attack could be something special if we sort it out. Also for the past two years we have tended to come good at the back end of the season. I still remain optimistic about what we can still achieve - but we really need to sort things out!

We look poorly coached as a team - no idea in attack - our only option seems to be an inside pass to a slow forward.

If Nathan Brwn or similar was coaching us, would we be a better team? Of course we would.

Noble has had his chance, and we have not progressed as a team at all. We are going backwards.

I'd have a bet on Brian McDermott as his replacement. Lenagan worked with him at Quins didn't he.

Good call - I'd ask him to bring his boots as well!

what about the other half dozen games - got a excuse for them too?

We'd get a photocopy of a photocopy - both Nobby and Mc are from the Elliot school of coaching.

Brian Mc would be a nighmare, more of the same but with 3 years grace to play the style!

I dont see any english coaches who excites me about taking over, i said last year we should of jumped in for Potter before it was too late and we didnt, i wanted us to get Smith before Wire did, we didnt. Now were paying the price for keeping with a coach set in his ways and unwilling to move on at the same speed as the game has. IL has to take the blame for our slump as much as anyone for not recognising what many others have, if Noble goes now hes got the chance to leave with his head still held high as the man who kept us up and put some stability but the longer he stays the more credibility hes losing IMO.

We don't now for a fact that he isn't doing these things. But one thing we can be sure of - he isn't going to do them publically.

Anyone expecting the chairman to slag the coach off in the newspapers will be waiting a long time, especially when there are still two thirds of a season to get through before we can realistically make the change.

For what it's worth, I think Noble's finished at Wigan. The peak of his Wigan coaching came at the end of his first half-season. Since then it's been all down hill. We've got steadily worse until now we're almost at the level we were under Millward, with everyone involved apparently clueless as to how to stop the inexplicable rot.

No club can remain loyal to a figure as badly tarnished as Nobby now is - not if they want to be taken seriously as a competitive sporting entity. The guy only just beat Barrow, and yesterday presided over the most abject surrender since the siege of Singapore. He's got to go, and I'm sure he himself knows it.

But I doubt anything will happen until a replacement is lined up - and this time that must be a TOP QUALITY replacement, not another journeyman who fancies trying his hand at coaching (Eric Hughes, Andy Goodway, Denis Betts, etc), or, worse still, a 'panic measure' inhouse promotion (like Lowes at Wire). Getting someone good may take time, but just because we don't hear about it, that doesn't mean the wheels aren't already be in motion. Let's just hope and pray that they are.

Jalapeno - there are many people who have been calling for BN to go for a while but without saying that he was the sole cause of our problems. Far from it. The players have their share of the blame and the backroom staff just aren't producing players with the right level of strength, power and fitness to allow the team to compete properly at SL level (yesterday being a prime example),

I have been saying for some time (and probably boring people almost as much as I do about the SC

) that there is a general malaise at the club. Standards have slipped across the board. I have been criticised for this by some (BK included, which just goes to show that while we agree on the SC we aren't actually the same person, as some Stains have alleged in the past!

) but absolutely stand by this comment.

Thinking positively about how the club can change this, to me the real issue is whether IL is going to start setting the agenda for success.

From what I have seen of the IL he is a genuine guy who cares about the club and actually cares about the fans. That's great, but if he's going to get us back challenging for honours he needs to raise ambitions and expectations.

Many posters on this board have this season been satisified with narrow defeats and mediocre performances. Many fans as well as the club have become infected with the disease of second rate syndrome.

What we need is for IL to start demanding nothing less than the best from the coaching and backroom staff and set expectations at a more appropriate level - realistic in the short term, but when he talks about the medium/long term he needs to start using language like "world class", "best in the world" etc.

We are Wigan, the greatest club in the world. For all his faults ML believed that, he made any doubters at Wigan believe it. He made the British RL world believe it (that's why some many envious people in RL hate us so much!). One night in Brisbane the Wigan club in its crowning achievement won the WCC, the greatest glory in a decade of unrivalled success (even outdoing the pummelling an all Wigan GB pack gave the Aussie pack on that famous night in Melbourne a couple of years earlier). We made even the Aussies believe it.

We may never - in the era of the SC (and general anti-Wigan bile and hatred) - get back to the top of that mountain but IL needs to aim high. A root and branch clear out of the club is necessary. We need new people, new ideas and most of all a new vision.

Noble out Morgan in

Spot on.

There's no certainty from hiring a "top class coach". Noble was the best British coach by a mile - hasn't happened. On the flipside - Millward was a promising coach of a lower league club - very little form whatsoever - and yet he won Saints two GF.

As for making Craig Bellamy "a great offer" - why on earth would he want to come to Wigan?

Let's be honest - Wigan is a club desperately in need of open heart surgery. Things may get worse before they get better - even with a great coach. He may end up under the same pressure Noble's facing. Why put oneself through it? I can't see Craig Bellamy wanting such hassle.

Wigan are - a minimum - of three years away from being competitive at the top level. A LOT of players need to come and go in that time. And they have to be the right players or that number keeps on rising and inexorably out of reach. Top class coaches have ambitions like anyone else. Three years hard graft (with the crowd always two consecutive defeats away from booing you) probably isn't one of them.

Money will bring in a quality coach. Whether Wigan are prepared, or able, to produce enough of it is another question.

All the money in Wigan's coffers won't bring Craig Bellamy. I can assure you.

You can't assure us of any such thing. You're a fan, just like us.

But for it's worth, it wouldn't have to be Bellamy to be a big improvement on what we've currently got. For which reason, I doubt Wigan would waste time setting their sights so unrealistically high.

Wont happen till the end of the season Think about it in real terms. For Noble to be sacked now the club would have to pay his contract up which would probably cost £100,000 then if we wanted a top coach and i would think all the best ones are employed it would cost the club again in a fee to the club he works for plus his wages. Then he would want to bring in his own backroom staff again costing money to pay up the ones we have now that he want rid of also he would want to buy in players your probably looking in the region of around £300.000 if not more its not worth it for now. The time to make the changes is end of season move people out and bring new ones in and start a fresh next year. There is no relegation so there is no panic all the change the coach with the change of wind direction is not what we need.

I'm struggling to see what this top class coach can achieve in the three years he'll need to re-build the current mess into something like a decent side. Mid table is the best that can be hoped for.

I'm sure enough to stake a modest wager on it.

Thankfully your opinion is irrelevant to Wigan's plans and ambitions. For which reason, this conversation is over.

I was under the impression there aren't any.