Just awful. And it didn’t even go as bad as I thought it would.

Dear Mr L,
I do not know what game you were watching but the game that I watched was utterly appalling. The players managed to show sparks of enthusiasm but generally were convincingly beaten. Poor Harry Smith was lost because of your decision to play his senior partner at fullback, you are ruining his confidence whilst blunting our main threat in attack.
I hope that your refusal to play Hanley in his preferred position is out of a desire to protect him from the s***storm that will be coming the way of some of the youngsters after the recent run of games. Not one young player has improved since last season and now they all look burned out. The only real spark of hope was the performance of Kai Pierce-Paul who will grow into a fine SuperLeague player.
The forwards are too small and inexperienced to play the role assigned to them because of poor recruitment of senior players. Tonight we had one real go forward prop playing, not because of injury but because of our inability to improve on those who we have let go. Wells would look a leader in our present team. When we did attempt to strengthen we could have picked up several battle hardened veterans but we tried to fix the problems with a single injured superstar. Now we need plan B.
The lack of any kind of go forward is killing us. Whilst I know that money is tight I hope that we have the vision to rectify the problems especially since for next year we are going to need to bolster our squad to enable us to play a reserve team. Ideally several of our starting squad will be playing in it.

That was probably me Matty
I could see June and July being a disaster zone and that was before additional injuries plus suspensions

I predict if Saints really do turn up on Sunday they will get 50.

The next match that I see us winning is potentially Leyth in August. Can you imagine though if they haven’t won a game by that time and we are on a long losing run?????

We are poor at the moment but Lam’s obvious limitations make the situation even worse. I’ve said previously Lam’s level is probably Judes or Pats as head coach.
Until he departs nothing will change due to anything that he does or says.

Sign a player because he had a decent game against us and then play him in a system that really does not work. Then bin him off. It is the Wigan way

Too many things to criticise to even bother. I hope we let Lam head home early but I can’t see it.

KPP was about the only positive. I’d love to see him in a proper pack though and not the academy pack we have to turn out each week.

KPP looks a really decent prospect. Unless he gets injured I can see him in the starting 13 for the rest of the season even when Bateman is back.

I think Shorrocks shows some potential but he needs to play in a much more dominant pack before we can the best of him.

Yeah I think it was. I was hopeful at the time that we would have found a way out of it but we are going deeper down the rabbit hole week by week.

As month's go this one's been a shocker for bad news:

Four losses.
Clubb banned.
French out for season.
Hardaker banned for headbutt.
Singleton banned for headbutt.
George Williams announcement.
Manfredi to retire early.
Forced to play with ten players out due to England game.
Bateman injury.
Hardaker neck injury that sounds serious.
Rumoured signings from lower league clubs.
Low ticket sales.
Fresh faced Saints to face us in four days.
Down to fifth with Hull KR breathing down our necks.


Awful.

I think Saints will come into Sunday’s game a little undercooked. If you can get on top early (a big ask with your current attack I know) then I think you could shell-shock Saints. They don’t seem to like it when a team gets into them early.

I predict another narrow loss for Saints on home turf.

I was so excited about the crop of young forwards coming through 12-18 months back but we risk hurting their development by playing them all at the same time. I think you can get away with maybe 2 or 3 young forwards in your 17 at most but even at full strength Lam is putting 5 in (Smithies, Partington, Byrne, Havard and Shorrocks) and tonight it was 7, with KPP and O’Neil in there as well. A lack of depth isn’t Lams fault but even when he’s had a fit squad he’s left out experience to make sure he crams the pack full of youngsters.

I totally agree.
I started to worry in the CC game with York. We struggled to beat a lower league team with injuries to key players. The crabby win against Salford convinced me that our lofty position was totally and utterly false.

I don’t think we’ve had a single piece of good news all season. Even the announcement of French for 2022 was preceded by the news that he was out for the rest of the season.

Unless Lam departs I think a bottom 4 place is practically guaranteed. I take no pleasure in saying that but I struggle to see how Lam can turn it around as he seems bereft of ideas and if I honest looks like a guy under stress frozen in fear so that his brain lacks any logical thoughts.

Don’t know much about McDermott as a person but if I’m IL I’d probably be giving him a call this evening to at least sound him out as an interim coach for the rest of the season.

If ts any consolation, Wigan scored more try’s against Wire than Saints did.

Lam quite rightly doesn’t rate Clarke or Bullock but that still doesn’t excuse his insistence on playing our young guys irrespective of the opposition or the toll of playing too much too soon.
I’m generally a supporter of IL but the signing of George Burgess is probably one of the worst in my lifetime. The doctor who signed off his medical should be disbarred.

My only crumb of comfort for this season is that we’ve probably got enough wins and Leyth are so (understandably) under strength that a relegation battle won’t develop as our losses continue to build.
Until Lam departs the season will continue its downward trend

There's a lot of debate and talk going on, players missing, for some reason injury, suspension or face doesn't fit. The simple action of accountably and effort in senior players is very worrying. They can seem to get away with very poor games. Tommy, Sam Powell, Isa, TC, NEEDS TO GO another with a few more. Harry S needs help, along with the rest of young players. Without help these young players could seriously affect their careers. If Tommy can't guide us through this stretch, i would seriously question any future coaching role! IL and KR need their decisions about directions of all aspects of club to firmly is club based and not personal based. Adrian was in wrong place in the wrong time for the job. Instead of getting somebody who can stand up to board and players, and be prepare players for each game, and who can ADJUST in the game to opposition or weather or score. The next 6-8 players to come in the 2-3 seasons needs to be hits. Build around Bateman and Farrell, hopefully the marine will recover his form. And forget about signing ex Wigan players from anywhere esp. Aus. The game is simply run your lines, passing and catching, moving around for openings and defending your patch and covering your team mates as well. Only been a fan for about 15 years, i don't know everything about the game. United as club from top to bottom we will be back as WIGAN, if we don.t it certainly be playing catch up with rest of the league. Encourage the players but make them accountable, that includes the club as well. Go Wigan.

To be honest I think you are being a little too harsh on Leyth. Whilst getting beat they put up decent showings against Catalans (scoring 30 points to our nil) and Hull FC.

We are struggling to score more than 16 points in a match (three tries followed by missed conversions in a match is a luxury these days)

That's very kind of you Matty B, but we are the 'whipping boys' of the division. Like us, you are missing a lot of players at the moment, and there is a long way to go yet, in what will be another 'covid-19' disrupted season.

KPP does indeed look a good prospect,and I think Shorrocks has improved, and has been been good in the last couple of games, although at fault for one of Wire's tries tonight.. But let's be right, in a sane world, he'd only be a squad player anyway. Marshall is clearly still some way off, but better than last week. Maybe harsh, but I think Smith looks less and less the answer.

The present situation at the club both on and off the field is similar to what it was at the end of the seventies when it was also in a similar financial and playing situation.

Declining crowds to around 2/3 thousand, cheap buys and transfers from other lower clubs, relegation into what is now the Championship. A situation which led to a take over of the club by the "gang of four" under the chairmanship of Maurice Lindsay and a revival and success.

Perhaps the time has now come for the club to be taken over by a new owner or owners with more financial clout than that of the present owner whose personal fortune is now nothing like it was at the time he bought the club from Whelan.

I fear for the future of the club under the present leadership!

I'm not one for moaning but I don't understand some of the clubs direction.
The team selections are crazy at times and the use of players is looking detrimental to their development. Examples last night, we could have played Hanley at fullback, young inexperienced yes but for me playing Jako
at one was already a failed experiment. What it did was leave us without any strike in our halves or from out the back and forced Smith in to making plays that cost us. Jako like always for me gives100% but he should be first pick at 6 or 7 especially when Smith is the other. Tommy and Powell you can get away with at 7 and 9 if you have a pack that gives you something to play behind and a genius at 1 like French. Our lack of any impact from behind the ruck is obvious it's an easy way to change the game it was always a position we should have covered better squad wise, in addition to giving us something different in games, we don't have any strike or ideas to change things up mid game that was an easy fix.
The way Bullocks season has gone? From being a starting prop in GF all trust in him seems to have been lost, I don't know what goes on in training but 10 minute cameos don't do us or him any favours. If he's attitude is wrong then drop him the way he looks to have been managed has heaped pressure on him and the other young forwards, I just don't get it. That sub situation carried on last night no problem with a young 9 on the bench but last night I did forget he was there. We lost Smithies early yet brought him on with less than 10 mins to go with the game gone Why? We had Clarke who could have shared some of the workload and given more experience to a young pack. On that subject I would also have got Isa back in the middle moved Smithies to a wider second row spot and played KP Paul to centre the young lad shows huge potential but 80 at second row in his third game? Hanley would have been full back, your coach showing faith in you can have a more positive effect at times than the negative of him not. He's played all his games out of position upto now(I don't count Saints away last year) for me that would have given the team more balance.
Our youth set up has been great but the want of what should have been the core of the team to go to the NRL has massively hurt us. Both in contracts to keep them and how to replace them. I'm not saying it's an easy fix and I know winning us not a given especially in such times but a little bit of hope and good news is needed. My lad last night who the likes of which fan wise are the future of the club said "we are just boring dad I don't see any rugby in us at times" The feeling of this being a real low point in all my years watching us is very sad.

Hanley wasn’t available last night for personal reasons.

Im not convinced by Smith AT ALL

Smith needs taking out the firing line for a while IMO. He’s playing on the back of probably the worst pack in the league and that’s not helping. His confidence looks shot to bits and until we do get him a proper pack to play off the back of, it’ll be tough for him to build it back up. His defence is the biggest worry for me and that’s the area he absolutely needs to work at if he’s to nail a regular spot. He won’t get in the team next season if Wane is back with that defence but good coaches improve players and we don’t have one.

Cleary would look awful behind Wigans pack. I always think its unfair to single out a halfback when his pack are completely and utterly dominated.

The fact that we have had no goal kicker and a second row playing centre all season and a goal kicking centre sat out on loan at London is baffling.

Who is telling Smith, Hastings, Leuluai to aimlessly pump out soft kicks down the throats of fullbacks week after week after week. May as well just hand them the ball back.

I've also noticed that we are frequently running back into the line after a tackle with backs turned away from the attack, that's just schoolboy stuff (primary).

A lot of people are pointing the finger for the state we're in at Lam and I understand why. He's a clown that needs to pack his red nose and drive his clown car back to Aus. But, the people only blaming Lam are missing the bigger picture, our recruitment had been so poor for 8 years now, the blame lies with the ginger clown - Radlinski. He's brought Lam into his jobs for the boy's club along with lackluster backroom appointments like Paul Johnson.

Get rid of both of them and rebuild. Does Pollard have the stomach for that?