nobody is calling for anyone's head. get a grip people. however chairmen (or investors if you like) always like to see progress towards their long term goals and are notorious for getting edgy when games are not being won. we still know very little about andrew glover, and the depth of his pockets, but more importantly his emotional stake in wakefield trinity. how long will he be flattered by the thrill and attention of being the main backer of a club which loses every week?

we've now lost four on the spin, all of which were winnable (i fail to see what huddersfield have except brough and a hell of a lot of structure and supreme self belief and confidence) which almost certainly this will be up to five by sunday evening. even in a three year plan, this is tough to swallow. i think the club have been very smart with the membership scheme and engaging with us all as this should help sustain crowds and keep a lid on most of the flak that would come the club's way should our run of form continue.

personally i think elston has set himself up for a fall by doing all the signings, then choosing a coach with a limited amount of creditable achievement on his cv.

all in all it's frustrating. i can see some very positive things happening in the club, but for the more flakey of fans (not the ones that are likley to read messageboards and be really engaged emotionally with the club) who we need to attract to be loyal supported in long term results and style of play matter an awful lot.

Although, not directly, you are having a "pop" at JE and this is totally out of order.

Two questions.
What choice did he have (bearing in mind the time it took to secure Mr Agars signature) ?
Where, honestly, did you expect us to be at this point in time ?

i'm not having a pop. i'm merely trying to analyse the situation as an outsider. if that's taking a pop in your mind then so be it. i think that elston has left himself wide open for the future wrath of a dissapointed owner. an even higher risk strategy when one considers that his mrs works at the club too.

i don't know what choice he had, but some of the signings we made were and remain questionable. what counsel did he take from others with regard to the players he signed? andrew glover is new to rugby league, so how much sense check could he apply to the advice on signings that elston was giving him?

why did the club fanny about for so long before appointing a head coach?

in terms of where we are, we're actually where i thought we'd be (although i would have expected us to have 4-6 points by now and not 2 given our easy fixture run), but i'm dissapointed we don't have the resolve and mental toughness to finish off games from winnable positions. sure, some if this is down to us being a new squad and i accept and promote that theory wholeheartedly.

give it a few weeks and the nutters on the terraces will start to lose patience with agar, if we don't start picking points up, it's then not much of a leap of faith to suggest somebody will shout and swear at glover. i feel that pretty much all the readers/posters on here "get it" in that it's a long term plan, but we need a few gutsy wins to win over our casual turn up fans.

Hahaha why is that the main thing? Sums up some of your "fans" mentality if you genuinely believe having a better team then Cas is the "main thing" and even that is very subjective 6 weeks into the new season.

I think its more a case of realising where we are. The league is almost in 2 halves

Warrington
Wigan
Leeds
Hudds
Saints
Catalan
Hull fc
Hull kr

Bradford
Wakey
Cas
London
Salford
Widnes

The best that Cas or Wakey will get this year is to be 9th (8h with a really good run), so on that basis, yes we do want to beat Cas, along with all the other teams in this section, although, as you know from last Sunda, this isn't straight forward.

Exactly

You've talked about having "spine" before FFF but you are hiding behind what Glover "might" do. Say what YOU feel. If you were in change would Elston be out of line or up for the chop or not? That way we can either agree or disagree.
Admittedly you may be doing it tongue in cheek but it isn't helping and you just back off when questioned and say it is just a question and plead innocence. I think you are better than that.

In my opinion Elston's benefit to the club goes far beyond the playing side of things, so Glover will not get rid no matter what happens on the field.
On the field - I think he has signed some great players, without a coach to direct his focus.
I can't think of anyone available last year that I would prefer to Southern and Lauititi. I think they were Elston signings.
He also saw something I didn't by signing Kirmond and Raleigh.
Added to that getting Smith when others were keen and spotting John.....I'm happy with his work.

From Agar point of view. Many criticised him going for Aiton and Wood when we already had hookers. In my opinion, he knew better. Both have been outstanding.

I agree, though not sure where I'd put Hull KR or Bradford.
The thing is, the difference between coming at the top of the second group or the bottom is a few points. So yes, its important to win the games we have been losing so far, but it doesn't matter when you win them. When we click, and i think we will, we could easily go on a good run beating all those teams in our section and giving the others a good go.

5 games in and lets look how the side have done Widnes 1 win,KR bit of luck could have gone our way,Bulls by far the better side in the 1st half silly penaltys the down fall in the second and not covering Jefferies.Hull awful conditions defending most of the game but a narrow loss.Shudds no one let the side down and didnt get mullered.The 3 early games that would show where the side sat was going to be Shudds,Wire and cats.Rome wasnt built in a day as the saying goes when it clicks I can see someone on the wrong end of a thrashing.Might need a tweak here or there but lets keep the faith.We need to make home games a vocal fortress and get behind the players not on the backs of players.The need to get behind the players and give them a boost is paramount come on get behind them sing shout and will them on.

Realistically I think 10th is the best either team will achieve.

well “might” is all we have to go on at the moment. in answer to you elston would certainly be in the line up and not chopped at the moment if i were glover. we remain a low cost and low revenue club at the moment, if it were my club, i be thinking that as we seek to grow and prosper i’d be looking at moving elston into a different position within the club as he has value to offer, but i wouldn’t have him in as the head man. again, i’m saying this from the outside, but he has very little in the way of qualifications or experience to be the ceo of a business of this size. he’s an ex- semi-pro player with more grey matter than most that worked his way up the pyramid in the same manner as francis “daft as a brush” stephenson did in his time. it’s a mark of how tight money is in the game that davide longo was offered the top job at featherstone.

you say my posts don’t help? it's not my job to help. i do think that it's better that we all think about the future; employees/players come and go. supporters like you and i do not.

i want exactly what you want; a strong stable trinity both now and in the future, the best possible outcome is that agar succeeds and that elston grows into being a true leader at the club. i too really like aiton and wood, but this is a great point, isn’t the flip side that glover is wasting money by paying the salary of ellis because agar and elston weren’t singing from the same hymn sheet despite the fact we already knew he was going to get the gig?

if it all starts going wrong for agar, he will have a natural defence when glover fires into him: jimmy signed my squad! here’s the risk that jimmy has run, i think he’s paid well over the odds for mellars and ellis to name but two, the budgets been spent and we’re 1-2 props light etc…

Maybe one of us being better than the other, or at least better than someone/ayone is the main thing because if either finish bottom and can show no tangible progress on the stadium front who says the RFL won't exercise their vaguely described right to withdraw a license before it's 3 years are up.

Can't argue with that. We do want the same things but I just think it is too early to get the guns out.

I am surprised how well Elston is doing. As you say he has no qualifications. He would not get a job with me for that level role, BUT he is proving his worth so far for me.
I take the point about Agar and Elston putting a team together seperately, but that is how it was and that is what we have to work with. No point going back to it now. Lets make the best of it.

Of all the subjects i have seen on this forum this is the biggest load of rubbish, it makes me wonder if the OP has an agenda or is only happy if the Club is going backwards?

I am not an expert on the behind the scenes going on at the club like Fat Faced Fan but i do know somebody at the Club and have, like most been coming to Wakey for 30 years and have seen and spoken to James many times.

Anybody who knows James or witnesses his work will tell you that this man lives Trinity 24 hours a day, if you go to any acadamy, reserve or first team game he is there. The OP questioned his experience, i understand in addition to being CEO at another Superleague club (Hull KR) he has worked in various departments including Community, marketing, commercial and as a player - i would say that is a good allround experience to run the club.

He did not appoint Agar by himself as they have publicly stated it was done with Glover over many weeks and they interviewed many candiadtes. He was also the person that brought Glover to the club in the first place and i undersatnd other investors (steve Kitterick) since.

He is an excellent communicator in the Media and have seen first hand his matchday hosting in the restaraunt in the flats, when the club was in its darkest days he was the one who the old board would send out to face the firing squad.

We will not always agree with things like selctions ect that is why we are fans after all and we are all entitled to our opinions but i genuinely belive we are on the verge of something and with a new team just have to be a bit realistic in our expectations and put our energys in to backing the Club and not putting it down all the time, just remember what hurdles we have overcome in the last 12 months.

Biggest nistake made was to give Agar a 3 year contract. He should have been given a one year deal to see how he performed. Lets face it he had no where else to go and would have had to accept it.

i totally agree. it smacks of naivety. yes we want stability, yes we want the same coach for three years, but only if he's performing. it’s also inconsisten with how we're operating elsewhere; look at the smith signing, he’s got nowhere else to go, we’ve given him a chance to show his worth, with minimal risk to us. why not the same for a head coach who probably wouldn't get a gig elsewhere?

You're obviously a big fan of JE and RA, also you also are being naive.
The fact is that our club survived by the skin of its teeth 12 months ago and achieved a SL licence by the skin of its teeth.
As fans, we love the club and would do anything to see it prosper.
However, as a future coach, the situation is that we are pretty much at the bottom of the pile and as such we would struggle to entice the very best players or coaches to our club.
No doubt, we ARE on the up and when there are more tangible signs of growth and stability, we will be in a better position to attract a different level of player.
We have a significantly stronger playing staff than last term and that is down to the hard work of Mr Glover plus, the 2 people that you seem to have a problem with.
Everybody would like us to have played 6 and won 6, but this was never going to happen.

If we had given RA a 12 month deal and then have a great season, do you think the only knock on his door would be from our guys offreing to extend his contract ?
Get real and SUPPORT the club.

the fact that club survived in the top flight by the skin of its teeth is not lost on me. however i fail to see why that fact alone invalidates the points that i and other have put forward.

agar did nothing at hull to warrant a 3 year deal, a one year deal which could have been upgraded at any point should he be doing well is clearly more favourable than what we've done.

to suggest that i don't support the club shows the limit of your appetite for debate and discussion.

The inferrance that you dont support the club is purely because, after just 5 games, you are having a go at JE and RA and not supporting them.
A 1 year contract for any coach would not encourage them to come to any club, unless it was someone new to coaching, who was trying to prove themselves and although there may have been this type of candidate, I dont think RA falls into that group at all.
We need stability and some growth before we can recruit marquee players, so for this season we go with what we have and look to improve during each of the 3 seasons within the franchise period.
If the fans support the management, coaching staff and players they will perform better that if they are constantly getting grief form all quarters.

i am not having a go at either james elston or richard agar. i am merely playing through a possible and not totally unrealistic scenario. much in the same way we do when we say, if warrington get a good lead in the first 50 minutes on sunday i see no way back for us.

richard agar was not exactly in demand, what do you suppose his other options were? humour me.

i don't think that either agar or elston are getting any grief of any size on here. i do think however that it will come pretty quickly for agar should results continue in the same manner as they are doing. the players seem well motivated and confident despite our run of losses, if we lose the next two or three games then i think morale will suffer in the squad and on the terraces too.

i too see some big improvements in the club, but to pretend that blind faith in the club and it's employees (of which elston and agar are two) is the way we're going to get the best for wakefield trinity would suggest you've forgotten how we got in this position in the first place.

like all trinity fans i want the best for the club, and for the supporters. at least we can agree on that?

Absolutely agree, together we ARE stronger

My memory must not be what I thought because I seem to remember Pearson had already relieved Agar of his coaching duties at Hull and his career over there was hanging by a thread. I also remember every other SL club had got their man and the only SL coaching job open was at wakey. It was a buyers market and if Agar wanted another SL job he could have had the choice of us or the dole.

Lets face it he hardly had a good track record. A one year 'probationary' deal was the way to go.

Obviously he is highly thought of by Messers Glover & Elston. Maybe you should ask them why, although I i've said, it certainly gives a level of stability to the club, which is better than chopping and changing.

Well if all we're doing is exploring hypothetical situations, errrrr... he could have taken that director of rugby job that Adam Pearson allegedly didn't offer him when he told the world that Agar wouldn't be leaving Hull FC for Wakefield... he still had another year of his contract to run.

OK I see your point. Also like you I want the best for the club so lets hope that come the end of the season we don't have to chop and change to move forward.

Agreed