Wigan v Leeds

[Wigan Warriors No 1 fan]

The ref and Wigan were disgracful.

[Wigan_forever1985]

I said before this match that while i didnt buy into the ref deciding matches, with Thaler he seems to have a real problem with Wigan every 50/50 call goes the opposing teams way.

Sam Tomkins needs a dressing down in training also, i can forgive the dropped ball, i can forgive the 40/20 debacle they were "mistakes" what i cant forgive is the try he gave away becuase he was moaning to the referee about a forward pass - you look he would of got a tackle in had he not spat his dummy out.

Sam is too good a player for that but he is turning into Paul Wellens, he cant have everything his own way - play to the whistle. I can see the RFL start sin binning him for it soon like Ganson did that time.

[ian.birchall]

Two poor errors early doors by Sam and a couple of dodgy decisions re the forward pass and the ball steal on our line didn't help us, but what really cost us the match was not having Tommy available. It doesn't just affect us by losing one of our halves, but also loses us the best loose forward in the country by moving Lockers to stand-off. I would have preferred to give Williams a start than move Lockers.

More like 3 when he stood there bitching to the referee and let Leeds run thru for the 3rd try. I am left pondering if he had a bet on with Thaler as to whom could make the most catastrophic errors to lose the game for Wigan :eusa17:

[markill]

Two poor errors early doors by Sam and a couple of dodgy decisions re the forward pass and the ball steal on our line didn't help us, but what really cost us the match was not having Tommy available. It doesn't just affect us by losing one of our halves, but also loses us the best loose forward in the country by moving Lockers to stand-off. I would have preferred to give Williams a start than move Lockers.

More like 3 when he stood there bitching to the referee and let Leeds run thru for the 3rd try. I am left pondering if he had a bet on with Thaler as to whom could make the most catastrophic errors to lose the game for Wigan :eusa17:

I don't think the 40-20 was Sam's fault. He would be the least likely to have known it was inside the 40 from the back, he needed a shout from someone. And the moaning to the referee - well we all know it was forward but he should have been professional and played to the whistle. He might not have stopped it anyway but you shouldnit stop, even if Robbie Farah did the same thing in Origin III - his team lost too.

To pin it all on Sam would be wrong though. Lockers and Charnley also knocked on in our own half in the first half. Sam wasn't in the defensive line that had a much slower speed and intensity than the opposition. Leeds were better than Wigan across the board.

[cpwigan]

On the other hand wigan where awful, Ben Jones Bishops 2 tries proved gelling isnt a confident winger and was blatantly out of position for BJBs first try.

That first BJB try had absolutely nothing to do with Gelling and to pin it on him is ridiculous!

Finch was the first man to be caught out because he was ball watching, looking at the ball carrier (not his man) ignoring the dummy runner AND the actual recipient of the ball. He had to desperately run across to try to cover his mistake but allowed the Leeds player to get in between him and Carmont.

That meant Carmont couldn't slide across quickly enough. He still managed to get in a good position to tackle his opposite number as it was 2 on 2 but the attempted tackle was a shocker and the player just skipped through in. Gelling had no option but to take the man with the ball who Carmont had failed to stop and that meant there was an easy overlap.

It had absolutely nothing to do with Gelling and everything to do with poor defending from Finch and Carmont. It's just wrong to pin it on Gelling simply because he was the last man beaten. He did what he had to do but it wasn't enough because of poor defence from Finch and Carmont.

Your normally on the money Cherry but on this occasion IMO you are wrong. Gelling was not at the races on the play, he should have been if anything slightly ahead of George ready to smash BJB. Thr only other alternative was to leave BJB and crunch Watkins early but that is more risky.

[Sutty]

On the other hand wigan where awful, Ben Jones Bishops 2 tries proved gelling isnt a confident winger and was blatantly out of position for BJBs first try.

That first BJB try had absolutely nothing to do with Gelling and to pin it on him is ridiculous!

Finch was the first man to be caught out because he was ball watching, looking at the ball carrier (not his man) ignoring the dummy runner AND the actual recipient of the ball. He had to desperately run across to try to cover his mistake but allowed the Leeds player to get in between him and Carmont.

That meant Carmont couldn't slide across quickly enough. He still managed to get in a good position to tackle his opposite number as it was 2 on 2 but the attempted tackle was a shocker and the player just skipped through in. Gelling had no option but to take the man with the ball who Carmont had failed to stop and that meant there was an easy overlap.

It had absolutely nothing to do with Gelling and everything to do with poor defending from Finch and Carmont. It's just wrong to pin it on Gelling simply because he was the last man beaten. He did what he had to do but it wasn't enough because of poor defence from Finch and Carmont.

Your normally on the money Cherry but on this occasion IMO you are wrong. Gelling was not at the races on the play, he should have been if anything slightly ahead of George ready to smash BJB. Thr only other alternative was to leave BJB and crunch Watkins early but that is more risky.

Even if Gelling had been in a correct position, Leeds would have scored. The centre went trhough Carmont as if he wasn't there. If Gelling had stayed on his wing instead of coming in field, the centre would have scored anyway. Granted Gelling was out of position, which allowed BJB to score, but they'd have scored anyway, so to pin it on Gelling is a bit unfair IMO. The try were Gelling jumped 3 pathetic inches off the ground and was outjumped by BJB, is more worthy of criticism.
That said, the whole team were poor on Saturday. The only thing that makes the loss a bit more bearable is the fact that we were crap and didn't deserve to win. If we'd played well and been robbed of victory by the inept refereeing, I'd have felt much worse.

[cpwigan]

Perhaps George would have got enough of Watkins to haul him down. It he was clean through why did he (Watkins) not score himself?

Re Gelling, he was yards from the line, watching is not an option. The best wingers I have seen defwending were the likes of Mick Sullivan, Billy B, Dessy Drummond who crunched opposing centres / wingers. Sometimes, you have to bite the bullet and kill.

[highland convert]

Just watched it to recheck my facts. Watkins was clear of George when he was tackled by Carmont. Before that he was covering the space between Watkins and BJB. Had Watkins been stopped by George and passed the pass would have been cut out. As the tackle was missed he was in a covering position. Even the commentators commented it was entirely carmont who leaked the try. Jim

[jobo]

Do you seriously think Wigan did not want to win as much as Leeds did yesterday.

Shaun Wayne thought so:

http://www.wiganwarriors.com/WContent.a ... 337&type=1

"But take nothing way from Leeds. They wanted it more which to me is gutting. They've some real warriors in their team."

Indeed Mike. Crazy statement by Waney IMO. It does not matter how much you want or do not want something if you give the other team all the territory / possession. Whilst not mutually exclusive, the team that wins needs desire / effort AND a well executed game plan. If we take the view of PM / Waney all you need to do is run hard / tackle hard / show you want it more and hey presto you win. Utter trip IMO.

Waney needs to ask himself why he selected unfit players. Most of us here me incl have the desire / want to represent Wigan but we are simply not fit enough or have the ability. Wane chose to select several unfit players who cleartly did want to win as badly as Leeds.

Does anybody think the reason hudds lost to Wire was because Wire wanted it more? Does every team that gets beat not want it as much as the opposition?

Effort alone does not bring success. It never has and never will.

Do you think Ricky Stuart said NSW lost their 6th successive Origin series because Queensland wanted it more?

We did want it just as much as Leeds, the effort was there. You've got to hand it to Leeds, the second half they were virtually error free, whilst we uncharacteristically, broke down all over the shop. 27 unforced errors, 3 by Leeds, 24 by us. Our biggest mistake was in not putting hardly any pressure on Sinfield on the last tackle. He had all the time in the world to place his kicks.

[doc]

Having suffered watching the match again I think that one of the factors that let Leeds get on top, besides our dumb mistakes and poor refereeing, was McDermotts team selection. Whilst far from being a tactical genius, his decision to counteract what should have been a stronger pack by essentially starting with three props by playing Bailey at loose appeared to pay off. He also took the brave decision to start with his quicker interchange hooker to try and catch us cold and get off to a fast start, bringing on his more defensive hooker later to try to nullify our attacking threat when we had to play catch-up rugby.