IL was panicking last year, he had to do something major to keep the fans happy.

Never simple at Wigan at the moment is it? Whether its owners, coaches or players why can't they just say what they mean and mean what they say?

How in a million years do you pin this on IL?

Signings for the next year are always announced when they are completed. If Hastings wants to be a bit of a diva then that's on him, but IL has a business to run and shouldn't be dictated to by things such as this.

Maloney, Widdop, Burgess all got announced when they signed on the dotted line & are all significantly more high profile than Hastings too. Hell Maloney was in the middle of a SOO campaign at the time!

There's simply only one man to blame for this whole situation - Hastings.

Got to agree on this here - despite Hastings' good season last year, G Burgess is a much more impressive signing from a reputation standpoint, yet he doesn't seem to be as much of a diva (if what Richie is saying is true). Although we are in desperate need of a good quality half back, so there lies our problem.

I'm remaining cautiously optimistic here. I previously had the impression that Hardaker didn't really want to be at Wigan either as he never mentioned Wigan or enjoying playing here. After a while he seemed to really warm to the idea and was more publicly enjoying his time at Wigan.

That said, whatever happens, I can't help but feel that we will need to be replacing Hastings by this time next year in the absolute best case scenario.

Think we're getting well ahead of ourselves here. I'm fairly sure we often allow overseas players an extended off season, the club have rubbished the rumours, that's plenty for me. I'm expecting him to do one season then head home.

An interview with Sam Powell on Wigan website says how he’s enjoyed meeting up with Mitch Clark and George Burgess . Says it’s going to be an exciting season but absolutely no mention of looking forward to playing alongside MOS Hastings . Speaks volumes for me , hope I’m wrong

They also rubbished the Edwards rumours!

I agree and I don’t at the same time. Rumours rubbished yes but nothing from Hastings? I’m not in the camp of “he should be tweeting and instafacing his love of all things cherry and white” camp but surely he could publicly say if he is intending on playing for Wigan? Publicly rubbish these rumours. Radio silence about Wigan is fanning the flames

You’d struggle to recruit Phil Mitchell......





In your dreams..... he’s a Saints fan!

Now Moley is reporting Hastings has gone cold on Wigan. Supposedly something in the deal he’s not happy with. Now NRL clubs are circling.

Does anyone now think we’ll see him at Wigan? I maybe negative but I’m 80/20 thinking he’ll never play for us.

There's absolutely nothing to be read into that. He's literally just mentioning a couple of the new blokes that he'll have spent a bit of time with in training. He hasn't linked up with Hastings in training as he's in Australia, so it's not really relevant. He just spoke about the two new forwards he'll be working closely with.

Any clues about Hastings future are likely to come from the man himself. I can't help but think that his silence on the issue is the most telling thing.

It's this bit from The Mole which is most concerning:



WTF.

Surely Wigan have to draw some kind of line in the sand. If this is true I imagine all Wigan fans would back the club on this? I would slap a massive fee on him 500k. .To do this at this late stage is not a good look for his character. If he does not want to play then no pay, how would the club stand if they played hard ball? If we can not secure a decent option then making him stew is better than strengthening a rival?

I was going to say maybe he'll stay at Salford, but unlikely now they've got Brown on the books as well.

Does he mention Jake Bibby?

The deal he signed a few months ago?

Seems odd that he's not read his contract up until now.

We’d be harming ourselves in the process having our marquee space going to waste.

I agree. From the reading it seems he asked Wigan to not announce his signing out of respect for Salford and their fans. Then was massively annoyed when Wigan made an announcement before the season was over.

But I agree. That was way back when. Somethings not making sense. I guess there’s more to this than we know.

That's why I said if we have no other option ? If we could pull a rabbit out the hat then that's fine . If we can't then us not having a marquee and another team being strengthened is an issue?

This has got a return of Matty Smith as his replacement written all over it haha!

In all seriousness I can’t imagine him wanting to leave us for another SL team as it wouldn’t make sense him signing or shaking IL’s hand in the first place and most teams look pretty stocked in the halves now...but if he wants to stay in aus then fair play and the sooner it gets sorted the better (if true)

You couldn’t make a move for anyone if Hastings is tied up as a Wigan player. As we’d be up to quota on the marquee ruling with 2.
Hate to say it, but if someone doesn’t wanna play for us cut your losses now. If this is the case he’s massively left us in the you know what; but at least we’d have the ability to bring in someone when the times comes.

And please don’t ask me who...or who’s available. No fan knows who’s available. Not really.

I get the impression he’d sooner finishing his UK playing days at Salford.

Would make sense on sentiment but they’ve got Atkin, Brown and Tui L as halves so you’d think they’d have to move one of them on...very interesting how this all plays out!

Really is. More or goes on the more likely he’ll never play for Wigan. Why Jackson hasn’t put an end to all the talk is beyond me.

I will believe that Hastings is playing for the club when I see that he has arrived in this country and is training with the squad.

Until then, I reserve judgement!