seems a cool young kid, but lets not get carried away he is a young kid...
looked great in a match we almost totally dominated, the test will be when he is back against the wall..

Nonsense Horne when fit will go straight in (Gentle said as much on the Radio after the Leeds game). He's our player not on loan to the club like Russell.

Will be interesting to see where Gentle goes with this, will he keep Russell at f/back and put Horney back in at 6
Or will he put Horney at f/back and keep Whiting at 6

I suppose it may depend how long we have Russell, if it is only for another 3 weeks, he may decide to put Horney there earlier. I would be more than happy if we kept Russell for the rest of the season though.

I thought he indicated he would go straight back in but I do not recall him saying where ?...I may have missed that bit though

He'll be our full back for the foreseeable future. Russell played well against Leeds, but he's here as cover for us as what we currently have at the club isn't good enough ie Reece Lyne. However if Horne is fit and available he will play there I have no doubt.

Hope your right, Whiting was awesome and deserves the chance to be able to back that performance up, which I think he will.

Quote of the day mate!!!!
if ever a player earned the right to another bash at a position then RW earned that against Leeds who remember didnt play badly but very much due to RW broke down around the centre due to his tenacity in the tackle and his ball skills were there for all to see from minute 1 to minute 80
has he had a bad game this season yet?

I expect (and hope) Russell will remain at fullback whilst he's with us, with Horne returning to the halves with Seymour. Whiting didnt play stand off on Saturday, Gentle said after the game that he was used as a 2nd second rower on the left edge, this was a tactic used to exploit Leeds in defence. Seymour effectively played the game with no halfback partner. I imagine Whiting will start at 13 against London, as I dont expect Westerman to be fit, Russell should keep his place, he looks very sharp and I'd be disappointed if we didnt make the most of him been here.

If we have Russell for a month,I'd expect Gentle to put Horne in the half's for our next match.

Russell has been loaned to us as cover for McKinnon leaving, so if McKinnon hadn't left we wouldn't even be having this conversation. The loan is not just one-way traffic, apart from helping us out, it is also to give Russell more 1st team experience and he's not going to get that by warming a bench spot. I can't see Gentle being so disrespectful to only play him once in the four weeks/three games the initial loan spell covers. I would also expect that if he plays as well in the next two games as he has in the first, then we'll be opening discussion to keep him for longer.

same here
Russel did too well to be dropped imo, especially seeing as he'd trained with us 3 times

My thoughts exactly

I think Horne is earmarked as full back for next season, so may slot back to SO when he returns. I doubt we will risk going the rest of the season with one half back. If Seymour got injured, then we would be left with Ellis and/or Nicklas. I recon we are looking for a new half back for next season to partner Seymour.

Playing Whiting as an extra backrower worked very well, but it should only be used if we have an injury to one of the half backs.

If Russell goes back in 3 weeks though I would expect he will go with Horney then, which only leaves Whiting, Nicklas/Ellis anyway, so back to square 1.

I think we will try and keep Russell for as long as we can.

Would be good if we could.

Who knows, we may grow on him!!

I just can’t see Tomkins wanting to go from FB into the halves.

Haha, it's catching on then.

Suppose it depends what happens with Finch, they have not tied him up yet, linked with Saints according to rumours. If Finch goes then I can imagine Sam may move to h/back with Russell coming through, if not then not sure I know they tried Russell on the wing and it never went too well. Either way Russell is signed up for a couple of years I believe, depends how much it would cost in compo I suppose, decent young prospect well worth considering.

Why?As it stand's Wigan have no experienced halves signed for next season.

They laughed when I told them this is what's happening...

Basically though, can Wigan afford to lose Sam's positioning and kick returns? Will his skill set at halfback outweigh this? I guess this is why they're having a look at Russell and how he copes at SL level.

Because I don’t see Tomkins ‘wanting’ to go the halves.

He may get told that is where he is playing, but I doubt they would get the best out of him.

A strange conclusion.

I'ts not where they'll get the best out of HIM.

Its a team game

1. Russell
6. Tomkins
7. Finch

might be better than

1. Tomkins
6. Finch
7. ?