Martin Offiah

[jobo]

Don't post very often but love reading the posts, especially the massive fallouts that have been going on. Don't want to fall out with anyone on here but to say Offiah wouldn't make the top 5 is, to put it bluntly, cr@p with a capitol C.

He was an out and out match winner. The best all out winger it's been my privilege to see.

I will say that he took very good care not to get injured, especially in that match against Cas when he had to gather the ball with Lee Crooks rushing in on him and he just lay there curled up with the ball. the most blatant example of a voluntary tackle I've ever seen.

Having said that, his defence and reading of the game was superb.

[Kittwazzer]

Having said that, his defence and reading of the game was superb.

To use your rhetoric "Cr@p with a Capital C"

[Kittwazzer]

and not a tackle Mathers could ever have pulled off.

That's a given!!

[DaveO]

If anyone has a tape of the Wigan v Cas cup final at Wembley watch Offiah's defensive contribution in that game.

It wasn't tackling but he used is his pace to save to two certain tries where he outpaced the Cas centre and winger despite them having a few yards start on him, got in between them and knocked the ball dead. He did this twice.

As to his tackling while he certainly didn't have the tackling technique of a Radlinski he usually managed to do enough to get in the way and stop the players going further and never shirked his responsibility. He was not a defensive liability unlike several other players we have had since he played for us.

Anyone who fails to recognise his contribution to the Wigan team he played is in IMO blind. He was a contributor to that teams success i.e. he wasn't successful because of that team but he helped make that team successful.

Some of his best tries were those he made himself when he picked the ball up in his own 22, went through the opposition and the length of the pitch without a finger being laid on him. There hasn't been a winger since with that ability. The mere fact his was on the pitch reduced the oppositions options because it was a stupid thing to do to kick to his wing.

Currently Saints have had Gardner benefit from playing outside a good centre and with us Richards has done well this year outside Carmont but there was far more to Offiah's game than taking passes from his centre.

Dave

[weststand-rich]

If you watch that compilation and think Offiah was anything other than a great, your RL judgement is severely impaired. He was fast like nothing else and unlike many SL wingers at present he backed himself. Class.

I view Offiah the player and Offiah the agent as totally separate non-overlapping entities.

[Kittwazzer]

He was a contributor to that teams success i.e. he wasn't successful because of that team but he helped make that team successful.

When he joined Wigan in Jan 1992, by my reckoning they had already won 4 successive Challenge Cups. How can you say he 'made the team successful'?

[ancientnloyal]

Wigan would probably have won the next 4 cups without him. Remember we no longer had the likes of Gill and the Iro's it's a constant change. David Myers? would he have won the lance todd trophy twice or been fast enough to collect off cassidy to score a classic? Even a bar is named after his 94 try in the first half. He was consistant, he roughly played the same number of games for Widnes as Wigan and scored nearly the same number of points. MBE's aren't given out for free.

His centre partnership with Connolly later on was second, perhaps, only to Boston and Ashton. Name a better partnership?

kitt you're putting up a good fight but entitled to your opinion.

[Kittwazzer]

I recall in the late 70's & early 80's, Sundays used to consist of a few pints in Swinley Labour Club, match, then back to the Swinley for the inquest. Prior to the game the discussion would be, "Can we manage a win today?"

Fast forward to the late 80's and Wigan became the first team to become fully professional and in no time, the pre-match discussion would be "How many do you think we will stuff up these men?" It was fun for a time because we had re-created our 1960's dominance of the game.

When Wigan signed Offiah, I thought it was just one cheque too many by a board which had become power mad. It was no longer just a matter of 'We want to win', but 'Everyone else has to lose!'. It was around about this time that I stopped attending matches regularly, and I was one of the few who had never missed a game in 2nd division!

In truth, I probably wouldn't have had it any other way, but I wasn't prepared to pay to watch what had by then become a 'non-sport'. I said at the time, a sport where only one team can win is no longer a sport! I saw nothing exciting in a game where one player could score 10 tries in a match against one of the best oppositions around!

My attendance wasn't missed. Hell, fans were coming out of the woodwork by this time, wearing their new shirts, scarves and hats and telling everyone who would listen how they had never missed a game since the Boston days!

Something had to change, and change it did with the introduction of the wretched Salary Cap, which Wigan have yet to manage successfully.

I am not saying shelling out £440,000 for Offiah was directly responsible for the cap, but it certainly sent out the message that in future, no club would ever be able to claim dominance by dint of the fact that they had the most money to spend.

That message was aimed at Wigan!!

[old hooker]

Martin Offiah was one of the best wingers ever to have played for Wigan. He was unbelievable at breaking tackles and consistently scored fantastic tries. If you think he was rubbish - I think you're rubbish at judging players.

He is now an agent. An agent's job is to get the best deal for his players. If he were a coach for Wigan his job wuold be to get the best out of the players at the club. He isn't so he doesn't.

Why the outrage?

Im with you Mike,he was an all time great and anyone who thinks he was rubbish is in a very small minority.As an agent his job is to get the best deal possible for his players and good luck to him.

[DaveO]

He was a contributor to that teams success i.e. he wasn't successful because of that team but he helped make that team successful.

When he joined Wigan in Jan 1992, by my reckoning they had already won 4 successive Challenge Cups. How can you say he 'made the team successful'?

He helped make the team he was in successful which wasn't the same team as four years previously was it? He wasn't the only player to join the side. But if you want to split hairs:

"He helped maintain the teams success i.e. he wasn't successful because of that team but he helped that team maintain the success it had enjoyed over previous seasons."

Dave