Chairman's Address

[No straw damn us]

The coaching staff are away for three days. It could be that they will not have Sky access.
The game can be recorded and watched later, it's no big deal.
The follow up presentation next week is!!

[Exiled Wiganer]

Breathe in
Watch this space.[/quote]

My wish list, in order of priority:

- new coach;
- conditioning and medical support to ensure we get to see the players we actually pay to watch;
- different hooker - please god Tommy will make his case...
- some new blood;
- if not 1 (though I imagine Wane will be gone by Easter in any event), an attacking coach...

Should I hold my breath about any of those (everything crossed)?

We will be renewing, but I will for the first time write to the club prior to doing so, expressing my deep concern about the direction the club is heading.

[Lord Byron]

As I've mentioned in another thread, I won't be renewing unless changes are announced before the renewal deadline.

I went to the awards evening in the hope that I would come away having been convinced that things would change for the better. IL's speech was ok given the position he is in but it didn't fill me with optimism.

It was more a case of things will stay as they are but we will look to improve. Not the answer for me I'm afraid.

[Fan4Fifty]

I've watched the video of this speech and though I've always regarded IL as a shrewd operator and having done some very good things for the club, this one baffled me with the acceptance that:
performances have been declining for 3-4 years;
season ticket sales have been falling at rate of 300/400 pa for last 3-4 years;
6 trophies in 4 years, followed by 2 trophies in 4 years 'probably' isn't good enough for Wigan, but isn't too bad either;
rugby league isn't in a great place and Wigan needs to play its part in improving that (even though our performances are in decline!);
club has made losses (as we know £600k last year) but this is set to improve.
Then there was the attempt to suck pressure away from the coaching team (SW in particular) by saying that the instruction from the top is simply to 'win' and 'create records' with the implication that you can't win and play entertaining rugby. And the plea to fans at the dinner to tell the management team if the balance between 'winning' and entertaining is wrong!!
Come on IL/SW/KR - you know that it isn't an either/or situation. Surely you can fathom the relationship between falling season ticket sales and performance without being told again. My guess is that you've seen nothing yet in terms of declining season ticket sales and the worst is yet to come. I just got the impression that new sponsors are more important than new fans, which, uncomfortable as it is, might be commercially true in the short-term, though can't be a viable medium/long term strategy.
Did I feel any renewed enthusiasm after listening to this, a boost that the management understood that this isn't about two games against Castleford & Wakefield at the end of this season, which they seem to believe is the focus of discontent? Not a bit of it. As IL himself said this is about 4 years of decline.
I can't fault the analysis, but, for now, the response seems woefully inadequate. [/list]

[DaveO]

The idea Wane and the team were instructed to win with the implication you can't do that and entertain is pathetic.

I think it's worse than just being simply not true that to win you have to forgo flair and skill as many have picked up on. For me it is an admission we have not got the players who can win games using flair and skill or that is what Wane and the coaches think. So the only way we can win games is by grinding out results. Fair and skill are outlawed and we don't even do skills training and ball work. We just wrestle all the time.

I am now more than ever convinced if we got a Trent Barrett standard half back in his prime from Australia after a few games he'd look as poor as TL being forced to play within the straightjacket that seemingly IL, Wane and even the team have convinced themselves they need to play in.

It's very disturbing because it is as if they all have some sort of psychological malaise and Joel's recent comments don't do anything to convince me otherwise either.

[fozzieskem]

I've watched the video of this speech and though I've always regarded IL as a shrewd operator and having done some very good things for the club, this one baffled me with the acceptance that:
performances have been declining for 3-4 years;
season ticket sales have been falling at rate of 300/400 pa for last 3-4 years;
6 trophies in 4 years, followed by 2 trophies in 4 years 'probably' isn't good enough for Wigan, but isn't too bad either;
rugby league isn't in a great place and Wigan needs to play its part in improving that (even though our performances are in decline!);
club has made losses (as we know £600k last year) but this is set to improve.
Then there was the attempt to suck pressure away from the coaching team (SW in particular) by saying that the instruction from the top is simply to 'win' and 'create records' with the implication that you can't win and play entertaining rugby. And the plea to fans at the dinner to tell the management team if the balance between 'winning' and entertaining is wrong!!
Come on IL/SW/KR - you know that it isn't an either/or situation. Surely you can fathom the relationship between falling season ticket sales and performance without being told again. My guess is that you've seen nothing yet in terms of declining season ticket sales and the worst is yet to come. I just got the impression that new sponsors are more important than new fans, which, uncomfortable as it is, might be commercially true in the short-term, though can't be a viable medium/long term strategy.
Did I feel any renewed enthusiasm after listening to this, a boost that the management understood that this isn't about two games against Castleford & Wakefield at the end of this season, which they seem to believe is the focus of discontent? Not a bit of it. As IL himself said this is about 4 years of decline.
I can't fault the analysis, but, for now, the response seems woefully inadequate. [/list]

This,the more I think about his speech the less sense it made.