I'm not sure where this notion that he's walking away from a marquee contract has come from?

If he leaves then it will be because he's reached a termination deal with the club. That deal will have been negotiated and will be one both parties are happy with.

It's been said a million times, but there's more to this than money. GB might lose a chunk of cash, but only he will know what price he puts on both his short term and long term health. For all we know he might be in daily pain and that to him means he'd be happy to end his playing career.

The one thing I don’t agree with is when people say he may walk away as he’s putting his day to day health at detriment by ‘playing on’. He isn’t doing that if he isn’t playing is he? So why walk away from a fortune you’re getting paid to have physio on your hip problem and do some light work in the gym, all based around helping the issue? If it’s no better than when he made that last comeback, they’re not going to play him and they won’t push him through a full pre season, so he’s getting paid for pretty much nothing.

If they’re to come to an agreement about a parting of the ways, we’re going to need Burgess himself to be really down about the situation of not being able to play or even train properly and not be of the opinion that he’s happy to simply get paid for driving to the training ground. If he is the latter I doubt there’s much we can do about it and I don’t blame him in the slightest.

I'm taking a different approach on it and i guess it's all about the individual and what they want.

Bring prodded and poked for the next 24 months with little to no game time can't be good. These treatments, like most physiotherapy, will probably be quite painful. He might be in daily pain with no real upside (especially if it's degenerative).

You hear plenty of stories about how difficult players find it when they get long term injuries - well this has to be the worst situation of all of these imo.

Yep, he's getting free access to top medical experts and physio whilst he's a Wigan player, and essentially being paid to deal with this injury. Once he stops being a Wigan player that becomes his burden to shoulder with his drastically reduced incomings. He'll also need to keep taking time off whatever job he gets for physio etc, and may struggle to do some manual jobs. It's not like he stops playing rugby and the pain, loss of mobility etc goes away.

Absolutely agree it must be tough for him but I just think him getting paid to take physio, to do light training and not play is surely preferential to walking away with less money than the full value of his contract, still have to deal with pain, still need physio, an operation etc but all on his own time and money.

Ultimately I think everyone hopes he does decide to retire but from his POV I’m sure he will hold out for the absolute maximum he is due. It may just be that to get that he stays around the club for the full length of his deal and whilst that won’t be good news for us, he’s entitled to do so.

Fingers crossed a good outcome is reached for all parties. One thing I’m convinced of is that his time as a top level player is over. We may get him to a level where he’s as good as say Tony Clubb (and that may take an operation and months out of the game) but there’s no chance it’s going beyond that.

Says he who chases eggs!

I still can't understand how he passed a medical in his condition, still baffling the guy can barely walk never mind run

yet he was MOM V Hudds there, or at least should have been

He had a half decent game but wasn’t dominant however, he did score a good try
I must admit coming home from that game I really thought he would kick on.
A fit Burgess would transform our pack.

he was excellent, tackled well also

That was the best away day i have had for ages. Absolutely pie eyed



ended up getting home about midnight after boozing round manchester all evening. George lost his balance at one point in that game trying to tackle someone and stretched out an arm and then proceeded to drag their prop down to the ground one handed. It's so frustrating this situation because a fit George Burgess is the best prop in the league but his injury is that bad he is currently by far the worst. Bring back Jordan James, all is forgiven.

Just trying to think of any other prop forward in recent history managing to come back from what appears to be such a debilitating injury / condition and manage to make significant contributions on the field?

Certainly not alone in thinking he would kick on from that game I think most who witnessed it thought he'd turned the corner only to find days later normal service had resumed.

Even if he gets fit I don’t think such a big heavy unit is the type of forward that suits the new style of game with 6 again etc. More mobile athletic types seem to be the way to go

Even for a big unit when he was in his pomp he was quite athletic. I don’t know whether he could ever get anywhere near that again, I’d probably say it’s doubtful at best but if in some baffling turn of events he did get back to that he’d be some player for us.

Interesting in Lams interview on Wigan TV today that he says everyone is back in training other than Hastings and French. The two lads who don’t seem to have been pictured in any pre season photos are George Burgess and Mitch Clark. I can recall seeing every player in one photo or another bar those two. Adds weight to rumours they’ll both be elsewhere in 2021.

I think you can add in the talk about potential mid season signings too.

KR has said that there's no money in the coffers, so it's reasonable to think someone will need to leave for those signings to happen.

Might need to scratch Clark off that list, just seen a few snaps from today and he’s training with the team. I’d be happy to keep him in fairness. I don’t think Rads did him any favours with his ‘one of the most destructive props in superleague’ comments but he was ok at points and I’d rather an extra body in the squad than us ending up short.

All depends on the financials that I think.

People go on about us having a top class reserve winger who would warrant a 1st team wingers wage. That won't work.

If Clarke is a squad player and his wage reflects that then fair enough, but if he is on a 1st team wage and we will never see him, then get shut.

Training for Burgess might mean physio rather than what the other guys are doing to be fair.

Fair point and I guess we’ll find out what’s going on at some stage in the next couple of months. It’s tough to see him starting the season mind, even if he is playing on.

As a Whino, I really hope G Burgess died recover and offer something to SL. I m set his older brother Like when he was at Leeds, is a real gentle giant.
Can't believe some on here expect GB to retire. Why would he? He's on a good contract for next 2 years. RL carers are short and you need to earn well, before packing it in.....

https://wiganwarriors.com/blog/2021/02/ ... e-burgess/ Cap space..

https://wiganwarriors.com/blog/2021/02/ ... e-burgess/ Cap space..

Plenty to play with, that's for sure. But can't help worrying that it might be a bit late in the date for a big coup.

Now it's official I've opened a new thread to discuss the fallout.