Yeah, but he gave the youngsters a Go didnt he!

Sorry, He did, 8 years after arriving, Going through some rough patches, stabilizing the club, getting them to match and eventually take over the previous Top 2 (Liverpool & Arsenal) and then bringing them into a stable & Successful team! Despite being often described as a Limited coach.





I wonder what we should do???

They didnt around 87/88/89 when he nearly got the sack and at some points were truly awful!
But they gave hon time & Had patience!

Mmm. So, if I get your drift, I have another 4 years to wait before I start enjoying myself again?

They do now, not in the first few seasons until the club stabalised.

Surely you dont go just for enjoyment do you !!!!!!!

Wednesday was great wasn't it.


Or did the adverts come on in your house?

Not really Jonh. What he did at another club is fact and so is a fair arbiter of his abilities as a coach. Whether he can take us to the next level is conjecture and so is merely opinion. There are points from both sides that I agree with (which is the reason I didn't want to enter the debate in absolute terms) and I agree this, and possibly next, season will be the acid test of his time with us.

Re Edwards: As I understand it Wasps have always been one of the top sides and, although I don't know for certain (read: can't be ar*ed looking! haha), feel certain they would have won something within the years precdating Edwards joining. If Wigan were to poach him as a coach now, as they did Nobby, then in your terms he will be a bad coach having left them in a 'worse state' than when he arrived. Just a point I'm making. I, of course, don't regard him as a bad coach!

Not really, They won the FA Cup 90 (That was 4 seasons) and the Premier League in 92/93 (After Blowing it the year earlier).

I think Most Man U Fans would have taken that in Fergusons 4th/5th/6th season after where they had been previous?

Look, The ususal suspects accuse Me & Others of Blindly accepting everything Noble does, That is far from the Truth.

There are many decisions/performances etc That I have been upset about or disagreed with.

My objection is with certain Posters who IMHO it seems can't wait to Bag the club and Hope for Poor performances & results just to Back up their Judgement on Noble/IL and increase their Ego's. (As I said earlier I am partly excusing Jonh on this

).

We as a club are seeing what the shoe is like on the other foot and "Some" fans can't accept that we have had to eat Humble Pie in the Bragging stakes for a While (An maybe a while longer) before the Universe is Back on track.

On the other Hand, I can't wait for the New season and get excited/dissappointed before & after every match, isnt that what supporting a team is all about?

Fell asleep, I've tried, but I just dont know what all the fuss is about, roll on 3 o'clock tomorrow !!!!!!!!!

I agree but it is a fact when he left they were on a downer and one which was not going to get better any time soon, in fact the Bulls like us this year some would claim are putting wrong the rights of previous coaches.

If the decline of a club is long term when a coach leaves then they have failed in my opinion, Wasps i do not think (also not sure and cba checking) the dominant force they became under the coaching of Edwards.

It's hard to judge that, we were certainly no great shakes at the end of 2000, when Elliott left. At the start of the 2006 season the team Noble had put together were doing fairly well, indeed they had just won at Headingley, had won the WCC and were reigning SL champions. Obviously the squad were weaker than the one that finished 2005, but the signs were there that Noble was able to get the best out of them, and they certainly performed better under him than they did once McNamara took charge.

At Bradford Chris Caisley had very little time for youth development and he seemed to think that the club could be continually successful by bringing players in, which is outdated thinking in these salary-capped times. While there is no doubt that Noble is more comfortable using, and getting the best out of, more proven players he cannot really be blamed for the fact that, when finances started to bite, youth development was way down on the list of priorities for the board at the time.

The problem with the anti-Noble brigade is they can't use facts to back up their argument because they don't have any, only hypotheticals and far-stretched opinions.

They try to mar his time at Bradford despite him being their most successful coach by saying he left them in a worse shape than when he took over. Bradford were suffering financially towards the end of Noble's reign and yet they were still champions and world club champions when he left.

They also argue all the hard work had been done for him by Elliott and Smith. Surely if he was such a bad coach he wouldn't have been able to continue and better Bradford's success over a five year spell.

With regards GB he took over when two massive names could no longer play for him in Farrell and Sculthorpe. Any GB manager would struggle with two massive voids in the team like that. Yet still I think his time as GB coach has been vindicated by that shambles in Australia (by presumably one of these "numerous australian coaches" whom some want to replace him with).

At Wigan he took over a club in turmoil with a massively unstructured wage bill. Not only did he pull us clear from relegation (again the anti-Noble brigade use the "any coach could have" line, funny this any coach has managed to be that coach both at Bradford and Wigan) he has managed to stabilise the club and provide a more balanced squad were we now have more competition for places.

I agree the next step is to take us to the next level now that the club has been stabilised but taking us to the next level isn't as easy as that. The next level is Saints and Leeds and their playing prowess is still far superior to ours.

I don't agree with every decision Noble makes when it comes to player selection but at this moment in time I don't think there is anyone out there who could do a better job.

The people calling for Edwards/Hanley/numerous australian coaches now will be the first in line calling for their heads two years down the line when we still haven't won anything.

Take it from me as a Spurs fan. Changing your coach every two or three seasons doesn't work. You may get better performances/results in the first 6 months but you end up going round in a circle back to where you started.

Patience is a virtue. I just hope the Wigan board have it.

But true.

Noble was the most successful coach that we've ever had at Bradford. His record of getting to finals and winning trophies speaks for itself.

The old adage goes that players win you games and coaches lose you games. I guess that seems to be thinking on here amongst those who say that Wigan win in spite of Noble rather than it having anything to do with him.

Of course the Bulls weren't in as strong a position in 2006 as they were in 2001 but I think it's unfair to pin that all on Noble. Finances were the bigger factor and remain the case.

If I were a Wigan fan I'd be wary of bringing in yet another new coach unless we're talking about a serious candidate with a proven up to date record in RL. So that even rules out idols like Edwards and Hanley.

Same here.

If Nobby wins no silverware with us at least he will win one thing, Wigan RL manager long service award

I'm sure if someone with undeniable talent came through, they'd get their chance in the 1st team. Playing kids just for the sake of it doesn't benefit anyone. I'm sure if there was a new Jason Robinson or Andy Farrell coming through, he'd get his chance.

They need to be picked on merit, not as a token gesture.

Again Jonh both points apply to Noble. Bradford where not (despite the spin put out by certain posters on here) the dominant force they became under Noble when he took over. In fact IIRC they hadn't won anything for a couple of years. They went on to contest the next 5 consecutive Grand Finals under his stewardship and won all the major trophies! The downward spiral theory is a red herring as far as I'm concerned as we can only guess as to whether he would have turned it round or not...just the same as we are guessing that Edwards will.

As for the part in bold, equally many would not. It is purely opinion and conjecture. The only real measure of his success during his time at Bradford was their performances while he was there and that record is exemplary; even to the point of winning one SL title with a record points tally! I refer you to the mass outpouring of 'please stay Nobby' sentiments that accompanied his last game in charge if you want to get a real 'overall' reflection of the Bradford fans opinion of him rather than that of a few outspoken loadmouths who populate these and other forums!

I doubt Noble was ar$ed while he was stockpiling the pots at Bradford

If a coach doesn't win things instantly or the next season then there are always idiots who want them out despite the bigger picture. People who would rather bring in unproven candidates simply because they were once legends on the playing field.

Then when the board buckles under the pressure yet again and the new coach starts buying new players and tries to create a squad that is their's, the same idiots moan about the squad not knowing each other, not being settled, and then start all over again by starting rumours about the players revolting in the dressing room and the coach having no respect.

Will they ever learn, I doubt it.

Whenever anyone points to statistics such as Hansen missing fewer tackles on average than Lockers a queue forms to rubbish the statistics. All you are doing here is quoting statistics and if instead of looking at his record you watched the way the team has played for the last two years there is plenty to complain about.

The stats alone give a totally false picture of his coaching while at Wigan. The two third places boiled down to winning a couple of play off games arguably because the players (and Barrett in particular) threw Nobbies usual game plan out of the window, but being unable to go one stage further and get to the GF. You have been hoodwinked by the format of the competition that means it all boils down to a few games at the end of the season. It is in effect just a contrived knock-out competition and the fact we finished third says a lot more about the low standards in the competition in general IMO that it does about Nobles coaching ability.

Unfortunately what has gone before the play offs in both 2007 and 2008 was at times some of the worst RL I have a Wigan side play in over 20 years and I deny you or anyone else to deny that has been the case. The regular season has been down right boring to watch in all but a handful of games and that is being kind.

Add to that concerns about his selection policy and how he will bring on the younger players there are IMO a lot of questions waiting to be answered which ought to decide if he gets a new deal here at the end of this season.



I would have thought this was obvious but since you asked:

Get the team playing as a team rather than one man rugby.
Have some different tactics other than five drives and a kick.
Bring the young players into the first team when the chance arises (tomorrow would have been an ideal opportunity but he failed to take it).
Stop with the stupid selections like the one he has made for tomorrow.

If he does all this then we might actually see some decent RL at Wigan and he might stand a chance of getting a new deal.

If he doesn't then we will have a repeat of 2008 where we actually went backwards from 2007 and if that happens he has got to go.

There was nobody more pleased than me when Noble took over from Millward and the atmosphere when he first walked out onto the JJB pitch was electric. Unfortunately saving us from relegation in 2006 is highly likely to be all he will be remembered for at Wigan if there are not big changes to the way we have played over the last two seasons in 2009 IMO.

Dave

What he said.

I don't know who it was who first came up with this idea the fact the squad wasn't his was a factor but whoever it was they are IMO a prize idiot and a master of excuses.

He is a coach and as with every coach when he takes over a team he is expected to coach the players he has and get results form them, not bide his time for three or four years while contracts expire.

If the fact it has not been his team has really been a problem for him it is as damning an indictment of his coaching ability an any you can care to think of because it basically means he is incapable of coaching players who do not fit into his mould.



What results are these? Worse in 2008 than 2007 in the cup. Negative points difference? A couple of wins in the play-offs but knowing full well it was not going to end in a GF appearance?

Dave

How is this thread still going, his record is immense, end of.

I'm not as anti Noble as some on here. I appreciate what he's done for us and his past record at Bradford speaks for itself.

Some people see its purely black and white they are either anit Noble or Pro Noble and it's not that simple for me.

For me tho the points Dave's made above are all extremely valid and concerns that i share with him.

We aren't an attacking or creative team you have to admit. Even with Carmont, Barrett, Tommy & Richards in our back line we fail to set the league alive. Did we not have a negative points diff last season? That's proof in itself for me of the negative style we play.

Can Noble really provide us with an attacking style of rugby? Yes our current style may beat Leeds or Saints once or twice a season but the best attacking sides in the end prevail hence why we've lost to Leeds three times in the last two years when it really mattered two play off semis and one CC quarter final. Saints have also ripped us to shreads far to many times as we can’t live with our style. We have and have had players that are equal to their Saints counter parts but the system lets them down.

His junior selection sometimes isn’t as bad as some think IMO. Prescott, Goulding and Mcilorum all got a fair crack of the whip last season all Nobles choice as well and his hand wasn’t forced as it was with Joel. Tomkins or Mcilorum should have been playing tomorrow tho IMO and I personally think Noble is to cautious sometimes for his own good. I do think Tomkins will get game time this season but tomorrow was the right time to introduce him. For some reason i can just see his first game being Warrington, Leeds or Saints wasy for some reason.

My real main problem tho is the Likes of Mossop, Farrell, Ainscough and the fact that they aren’t going to see much if any first team action this season. These three are prime candidates to go out on loan like Saints have done with their youngsters who aren’t going to get game time as they are wasted in the reserves.

I’d also like to add another point to the ones DaveO mentioned. This Wigan side is very, very inconsistent and fails to get up for the so called lesser teams. Yes his teams peak at the right time but in some respects its to late by then as the challenge is insurmountable IMO hence why we always fail at the semifinal stage. In order to go that extra game you have to get in a better position by winning more league games in the season.

It’s not all doom and gloom but also there are some things wrong with Noble’s time so far as Wigan coach. I do worry about the development of players at our club under him. Not if they will get game time as eventually I do think he’ll give them all a shot but if they will be ready when it comes round. You have to admit the Saints youngsters will be stood in better stead when they get their chance as they’ve been forced out of the academy comfort zone and gone on loan.

Have you not read anything that has been said on this thread?