Press conference

[THE 18th Man]

IL said 8 players will be going to the NRL from Wigan over the next five years. thats quite a specific number, we know Mossop and Hock have gone and Sam will be going but who are the other 5. are they first team players or Academy players on loan?

[cow yeds]

8.......... i've got stomach ache. :eh:

[Kittwazzer]

8.......... i've got stomach ache. :eh:

I'm saying nowt. I thought the dream would end when Madge went home early. It didn't, we finished top of the league in Wane's first year. Then I thought it would go tits up with the loss of George, Tommy, Finch, Lima & Hock. It didn't, in fact apart from the now compulsory loss to Huddersfield, we seem stronger than ever. The confidence within the team seems to know no bounds.

Despondency belongs quite rightly on RedVee and it is there in abundance. There is no place for it on here at present!

[Ron Doran]

Kittwazzer - 100% with you my man.

[bocco]

8 players over the next 5 years well 2 have gone 7 no doubt we will have some coming over from OZ so we will flourish as always

[exile in Tiger country]

8 players over the next 5 years well 2 have gone 7 no doubt we will have some coming over from OZ so we will flourish as always

Why do you think we will have players coming from Aus?
There is far more money in the Australian game, which is why they can lure our players. We only want the best, and the best Australians won't come because they don't get representative honours if they don't play in the NRL.
Hetherington' s rule change has already seen Wane say the club can't risk bringing in Aussie players to develop, such as we tried, before the rule change,with Gelling.
I doubt we'll see much South to North traffic.
Even with "first refusal" terms in contracts, it could be a bleak few years for Wigan, and for the standard of Superleague in general.

[Owd Codger]

I think you will find that they are on about some of their rising young players coming over here and gaining first team experience in our game at Super League level. Not all the good players down under are on top money and because of their larger number of good players cannot get into their first team squads.

A bit like the way that Wigan, Leeds and St Helens keep producing players and then releasing those they can't keep to lesser club's who cannot produce players of their own at the same level.

As for Welsh players, don't be surprised if more of their fringe players come to our game as there are now only four class club's in Wales, namely Cardiff, Llanelli, Newport and Swansea. The remainder are now no bigger than many of our championship club's with little or no money to pay players.

[Shaun1967]

Why do you think we will have players coming from Aus?
There is far more money in the Australian game, which is why they can lure our players. We only want the best, and the best Australians won't come because they don't get representative honours if they don't play in the NRL.
Hetherington' s rule change has already seen Wane say the club can't risk bringing in Aussie players to develop, such as we tried, before the rule change,with Gelling.
I doubt we'll see much South to North traffic.
Even with "first refusal" terms in contracts, it could be a bleak few years for Wigan, and for the standard of Superleague in general.

Pat was never the best winger in Oz. Carmont struggled to get a game there.

What we need to do is carry on as we are identifying players who compliment our squad. I was sceptical about last years signings but looked at how they've slotted in seamlessly, if anything making us stronger.
The way some people are responding on here it's as if IL was single handedly trying to destroy our club.

[shaunedwardsfanclub]

IL said 8 players will be going to the NRL from Wigan over the next five years. thats quite a specific number, we know Mossop and Hock have gone and Sam will be going but who are the other 5. are they first team players or Academy players on loan?

Both. At least IFL has got a plan.

[DaveO]

There are a couple of interesting articles that relate to all this knocking about.

The first relates to Leed's attitude to approaches for their stars.

http://www1.skysports.com/rugby-league/ ... ing-to-NRL

That is a pretty unequivocal statement about Hethrington about knocking back approaches for players.

".... and I can confirm Leeds Rhinos will not be selling any of our players to NRL clubs."

Whereas we just sold two...

This one from Andy Wilson us (unusually for him!) pretty cose to the mark IMO in terms of a realistic assessment of the currect state of affairs:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2013/ap ... of-six-nrl

I thought this was interesting from that piece:

"Of course this (losing our players to the NRL) poses major challenges for the club game in this country, and France. If the whole England team ended up in Australia, as some have suggested it might, that would hugely erode the appeal of the domestic competition. "

That can't be understated IMO. The idea it's going to be good for England if they go there ignores this point and it a serious issue. He also said this:

"That is why, as Lenagan suggested but did not confirm, discussions are under way behind the scenes about a major revamp of the Super League, to give the leading British clubs more opportunity to fight back."

That will be interesting to see but whatever it's about if anything as I keep saying there is only one way to fix it and that is get a lot more money into the game and the only place that can come seemingly from in sufficient quantity is from TV rights.