Spot-on DaveO!DaveO posted:It certainly is different and whether or not he is any good at running the ship within the new rules people seem to expect him to assemble a team with strength in depth when the rules simply don't allow it.robjoenz posted:
With the exception of the Ellis -v- Reardon/Langley saga Caisley and Hetherington seem to be doing a better job than Lindsay. I'm not saying I know who can do a better job but I feel it's time to look elsewhere, the salary cap climate is very different to the one in which Lindsays' praises are being sung.
You can have 20 players paid more then £20K a year and that is your lot.
The team that is successful next season will be the one that is lucky with injuries. If Leeds had our injury problems last year they would not have won it, simple as that. They would not have functioned anywhere like as well without McQuire for weeks on end or three senior props missing with one of them forced out of the game permanently.
I mentioned in another thread about a game I saw from 1991/2, Saints v Wigan cup semi final and sure enough the Wigan squad was awesome. But so was the Saints squad and watching that game the level of play was higher then I saw from most games last season. Only games like Wigan v Leeds at the JJB were in the same league.
You can't have experienced cover in every position because you are not allowed to pay a reserve team the wages required to employ them all.
Look at Leeds in the half back slot, they have Burrow, Dunneman and McQuire and if two of those three are injured you are talking about Sinfield coming in from loose forward and someone else taking over at loose.
IMO we are better placed for cover at half back than Leeds are with Moran, Orr, Coyle and O'Loughlin.
If you add to that the fact we are now playing in the same season as the NRL getting players here is much harder than it was as they won't give up an NRL careeer to come here in their prime unless things are not right at home (e.g. C Smith who had fallen out with the judiciary).
I also am pretty sure Betts will say things like "We need another centre" but I he can't just say "I want so and so as he is a top centre" because the player probably won't be available. So it is then up to ML to go and find "a" centre, the best available.
At the time we signed him that player was Vaekeli or however you spell it.
The rules are different now and all clubs have got to compromise their squads somewhere and how they do that and what luck they have with injuries are what will determine where the trophies go all else being equal.
Someone posted a team list showing who could play where and that shows how quite a few of our players can play in different positions. This is now forced on teams because of the 20/20 rule and personally I don't think it does a great deal for the overall standard of the game in the UK but that is how squads must be these days.
Dave
This is my first post having read the messages on this site for some months.
As my username might suggest, I've been around the block a few times and commenced watching rugby league in general and Wigan in particular in the mid 1950's. During that time I have had the privilege of watching some of the finest players in the world at the time playing in cherry & white. Indeed, I would go so far as to say that no other English club can rival Wigan in this Department.
In the past, signings have been the result of meetings of the Board of Directors and have been very much hit and miss - sometimes with laughable / disastrous results (no names mentioned).
Since Maurice Lindsay saw fit to join the club, we have enjoyed the longest period of success in my time and for my part, I hope he stays for many years to come. In the main, his signings have been players who have contributed considerably to Wigan's success but as DaveO rightly points out, we have to operate within the constraints of the salary cap (which in my opinion is illegal and is not working anyway - but that's a different story) and although we would like to keep all our young prospects, the finances won't allow it.
Leeds is about 2 or 3 years further down the line as regards its youth development but pretty soon, those young players will be asking for similar contracts to the senior players and what will Mr Hetherington do then?
The whole point of this diatribe is that we should consider ourselves well blessed with Maurice and stop looking at the other man's grass - even though it may be greener than the JJB pitch at present!!!
A last word for the site creator / manager / supervisor? - Mike. A fantastic job - love the festive graphics - keep up the good work.