Been on holiday for a year IMO

if nobby and co couldnt get riddel and fekka fit . what makes us think the the new coaching staff will do ?????

Quote ="jameswk"if nobby and co couldnt get riddel and fekka fit . what makes us think the the new coaching staff will do ?????'" www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJJwo87Q_zE

Quote ="jameswk"if nobby and co couldnt get riddel and fekka fit . what makes us think the the new coaching staff will do ?????'" www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJJwo87Q_zE

I think MaGuire is very eager to get Piggy back here in training. Your hooker is an eminent player to the team. They dictate your play from nearly every POTB. It is crucial IMO that a hooker is one of the fittest players in the squad and I wish we could see the return of 80 minute hookers - is it any wonder the World's best (Cameron Smith) can play for 80 minutes? He is on the field for the greatest amount of time so can continue to dictate the play, organise the team and get a greater foothold in the match. Would he be able to still do this coming off after 20 minutes? The NRL hookers stay on the field longer than the Super League ones. Is this a reason for the vast difference in standards?

I worry about Mark Riddell. He doesn't strike me as a professional athlete. Paramatta had a clear out & quickly got shut of Mark Riddell before Daniel Anderson arrived - in fact I think they released him from his contract a year early and from it Paramatta have noticeably improved. IMO Mike MaGuire would not have signed Mark Riddell had he been at the club and IMO I think that Mark Riddell based on last years form, the fact he is not here for training, and the fact he has (as Mike MaGuire has said) " to do a lot of hard work to get himself fit" will be the third choice hooker at the club at the moment & rightly so. Mark Riddell is supposed to be a professional athlete and I question his professionalism due to the lifestyle he openly admits to having, and his attitude due to the fact he has left the country twice in the time he has been here at crucial points in our calendar & subsequently will arrive late for pre-season training. How can MaGuire put set moves and structures together in practice when Riddell isn't here? Not to mention he is vastly unfit. He will have to prove himself above Leuluai and McIlorum that he should be the starting hooker for Wigan RL in 2010 under this new regime.

Bottom line: Your hooker should be one of your best players in the team due to the important role they have in your teams play. Is he one of the best players in the squad? Is he one of the best hookers in the competition? I don't think Mike MaGuire will start this season with a hooker he has already openly proclaimed 'unfit' and rightly so. He says everyone will have to prove themselves worthy of a first team place - IMO Riddell more so than others as he will arrive late for pre-season training and he is one of the players that needs to see to have the greatest improvement in both fitness and form.

I remember one of them when his life long best friend gave birth to a still born (well his wife did) and I have no issue with him going home for that. When was the other time?

Quote ="Pemps"Here you go en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lauren_Harries'" Is that the love child of Sean O'loughlin?

Quote ="Pemps"Here you go en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lauren_Harries'" Is that the love child of Sean O'loughlin?

It was Glenn Hall whos signed for bradford.It was there first child also

Anyone who as issues and problems with Mark going home for that need to look at themself very quickly.

Looks like we've found next seasons scape goat. Earlier than I expected too.

I think a more important question - though it's now academic, to be fair - is why couldn't Nobby and co get Riddel and Feka fit?

It's not like it wasn't part of Nobby's job.

Nothing against Noble and the prior success he's had as a coach but the game always moves forward even tho some coaches don't!

I think Nobles style of coaching has had it's day.

The old boys network doesn't give the results the modern day game requires and if you can't move away from it the game leaves you behind

Fair enough to the above then.

The other time is now.

Both St helens and leeds have had great hookers and a settled half-back pairing for a few years now. Does this have any relation to the fact they have been the best 2 teams?

Riddell would be better than last season if he was fit, but from last seasons form, I see him as a poor signing. Had we not signed him we could of spent that money on a prop or a world class half-back. Instead we are stuck with 3 hookers and Paul Deacon (who may do well, but he is not class anymore).

Certainly not on my part. I thought I had been constructive in my comments. What parts of my post do you disagree with?

That makes me smile.

Certainly. Matt Orford, Richie Myler and Sean Long are just a few examples of new halfbacks at struggling clubs.

Saints and Leeds have always had someone to lead the around the park. Keiron Cunningham has done it for Saints & Kevin Sinfield has done it for Leeds. I hope Sam Tomkins can do the same for us, but he is very young & still fairly inexperienced compared to some of the halfbacks in this league. That's why the Paul Deacon signing is an excellent one - for his experience and coaching alone.



Riddell would definitely be better if he was fit. Let's not forget this guy has played state of origin before. There is an excellent player in Riddell and it irritates me we haven't see this from him. Do I see him as a poor signing? So far yes. I would have liked to have moved Leuluai to hooker with McIlorum and looked to an experienced halfback to partner Sam Tomkins - Greg Bird? But hindsight is a wonderful thing I guess. Riddell is one of the players Shaun Wane must have been referring to when he has said he wants to see a '20%' improvement in players & Riddell's name is the only one Mike MaGuire has mentioned in regards to fitness which suggests to me he is very frustrated he is away and is eager for him to return to start work immediantly.

Sam can certainly do the same for us long term but atm I really want him to develop his game more and become a better player and begin to boss the team around when its needed.

Riddell can be awesome if he gets fit but I don't see him being an 80min hooker and Cam Smith style. Every part of his game other than his strength (weight) is behind Cam Smith.
Yes we can cover over it with "hopefully he will come good" "his stats show up better than highams" but at the end of the day....

6 Tomkins
7 Orford, Bird.... someone like that



9McIlorum

14 Leuluai

maybe a new prop.

Looks alot better than what we have right now.

I am still really annoyed that in 2 years under Noble, he never noticed Leuluai was a better hooker than half-back. Many problems have stemmed from this one thing.

Will Riddell really look awesome playing his old game though, from what I saw of him and a classic example is on youtube, alot of his good stuff was on the back of QPTB but we don't get these in super league anymore.

Roby
Pryce
The rest of the QPTB merchants...
..have been poor all year really.

IMO the only way for Riddell to truely fit in is for him to get fit, earn his place over the others and then organise our pack and play simple rugby with good distribution and develop his kicking game, he does many stupid plays and sometimes tries to hard.

At this current moment in time though, he is a waste of money, a waste of a quota spot and a massive dissapointment looking at the whole picture. Mark Riddell is an example of a player who is stealing a living.

Before I get stick off anyone, this is a very one sided post, I could post good stuff about him if I really wanted

Leave the guy on the bench as a short term impact player until.
A: He proves he deserves a starting spot
B: His fitness & commitment improve A LOT !

I've not quoted your post

I'm sorry, but what are you talking about?

A. This should apply to ALL players. McIlorum and Leuluai should be in exactly the same spot - i.e. Nobody has a place in the team yet.

B. Fitness - I'll give you that, but IMO we have the best fitness and conditioning staff in the league now.

However - COMMITMENT....
How precisely has he shown ANY lack of commitment ????
He nipped home to console a life-long friend who had just lost a baby.
Having had 2 friends of mine go through exactly the same thing, I know just how devastating that can be.

And as for his honeymoon....
Has anyone actually considered the fact that he would have ASKED whether this was a good time to get married, and that NOBLE (because that was his boss at the time) would most likely have said "Yes, that's fine because pre-season training doesn't start until the first week of DECEMBER (like last year IIRC).
It's not Riddell's fault that the new regime has come in and brought pre-season forward (quite rightly IMO), and this would have been booked at least 12 months ago.

Just lay off him, and stop trying to find a scapegoat before we're even 2 months from the start of the season.

I'm sure that he'll be getting worried enough that the rest of the squad are a couple of weeks ahead of him in terms of fitness, but it also wouldn't surprise me (from what I've seen/heard about both Maguire and Bitcon) if they've sent him some "homework" and asked him to start in the hotel gym while on holiday.

Hey, hey, hey. Let's not let facts get in the way of a good pre-season lynching.

Perhaps we fans should now lay off the players - even the usual suspects - and see how they respond to what is in effect a completely new regime at Wigan.

There may have been all kinds of reasons why the likes of Riddell, Roberts, Pryce, Feka etc underperformed for Brian Noble.

We should wait and see if they continue to underperform for Mike Maguire. If they do, then we'll know there's a problem. Until then, a clean slate for everyone is surely a good idea.

Even Pryce ?????

(j/k

)

Depends who is on top !

Last season he wasnt good enough, but still an improvement on what we had. I think the biggest reason he gets so much stick is because we already have a hooker in the team who most prefer in that position in Leuluai, same with Roberts i think he gets most of his stick because most people would prefer to see Ainscough but it doesnt make them bad players.

Maybe in 2010 Piggy will be more settled in, a new start in married life and having his best mate in the country (glen hall) wont do him any harm.
Its a new start for all players and I think they all deserve a 2nd chance next year, for me Nobles style of coaching wasnt right for the team, we werent big enough and our backs have been wasting their talent for a couple of years. I think we will see massive improvement in most players next year.