A Bit Long in the Tooth?

[Ellie from the Block!]

Last night whilst watching Eddie and Stevo slag us off with Clarkey trying to jump to our defence as usual, Stevo (I think) made a comment about our forwards being a little long in the tooth compared to a lot of the league and this being a shortfall for our team in comparison to the likes of Bradford, Leeds and Scum.
At first I was narky as usual with the constant Wigan-Hating ways that Eddie and Stevo always show... but then I thought do they have a point? We have O'Connor, Pongia, Smith and Cassidy. I know that based on last nights performance it seems nonsense, but I just wondered what you all thought about this matter as it did make me think for a minute.

[MrsLam]

What does long in the tooth mean?!
Sorry I've never heard that before :conf:

[robjoenz]

Yeah, there are occasions when their ages show, but there are times like last night when it doesn't matter. Last season Craig Smith was fantastic all year, especially since the arrival of Pongia that shaped the forwards up a lot. There have been times this season when they've looked old, they've not really hit hard into the opposition front line and made few metres. Although they can have good games we do need to get some younger props in the squad. As for second rows, we've nowt to worry about, perhaps Cassidy is nearing leaving the team, but we have enough good young second rows to keep us going.

[MrsLam]

Age is experience in our case though, we cant afford to lose our older guys there'd be hardly any experience in the team then!!

[robjoenz]

There is that side of it too. I think we need another couple of younger props and perhaps then we could afford to lose either Smith or O'Conner and have a nice mix of youth and experience.

[Cleveland Pieman]

Few better than Danny S last night. Really up for it and well done to denis for taking him off when he did. Before the stains could get to him.

[Fraggle]

Ellie from the Block! posted:
Last night whilst watching Eddie and Stevo slag us off with Clarkey trying to jump to our defence as usual, Stevo (I think) made a comment about our forwards being a little long in the tooth compared to a lot of the league and this being a shortfall for our team in comparison to the likes of Bradford, Leeds and Scum.
At first I was narky as usual with the constant Wigan-Hating ways that Eddie and Stevo always show... but then I thought do they have a point? We have O'Connor, Pongia, Smith and Cassidy. I know that based on last nights performance it seems nonsense, but I just wondered what you all thought about this matter as it did make me think for a minute.

We do have a problem in that respect, we're busy bringing players from the youth teams into other positions but the only new prop we've had in the last 2 years is Danny S. With Smith, O'Connor and Pongia all either retiring this year or next, we're going to need some fresh blood. Or maybe there are long-term plans to move Faz to prop (think about it, 6'7, biggest player in the team doing great at being a battering ram at the moment!) or Newton who's done it before on occasions. To say old is rubbish is nonsense, Craig Smith was marginally my MoM on Friday (too many choices!) and Terry O was breaking more tackles than I can remember in a long time, so those two don't seem to suffering from old age. I think that just because Stevo's an antique and long-since retired from the sport he wants some other players to start catching him up!