Batemans's departure confirmed

[Wigan_forever1985]

Whichever way you look at it until Bateman is replaced and we know the quantity he is replaced with then we are worse off.

Barring Farrell even a 70% bateman is probably our 2nd best back rower and a senior seasoned international winner- so if we dont replace him we are weaker and if we end up with a "project" player we will be weaker.

From the outside looking in it doesnt seem he gelled with the team and the environment the way he did first stint but only those in the dressing room will know if thats true or not.

Personally i dont think we need to replace him in the back row this year i think we could manage with what we have. If i were to strengthen us id be looking at 2 positions either

- an out and out 13 with ball playing skills and size (quite rare admittedly)

- a senior hooker to play spelled with Powell and provide cover in terms of injury, add to this i would send O'neill out on loan as i think he needs lots of game time to develop which he wont get at Wigan and he could end up like Jake shorrocks going deep into his 20's without ever having a run of games

[PJC]

I don’t know all the details of Wigan’s finances but we made a loss. In my view we would be better saving money and developing and then keeping players that have come through the club.
We would not get an instant star but the club would be a little more solvent .
The club needs to develop a culture that says yes I want to stay at this club.
To the management’s credit they have already recruited some talented players

[lucky 13]

No sports clubs really make money.
Our debts 9m are mainly to ourselves or in reality Ian Lenegan we also took advantage of government covid loan for clubs around 1.8 milion with not much interest. To put it in real terms Saints have debts of double ours and lost more over covid period of two years than we did even though they got money for stadium use for SL and vaccination centre. Leeds more wire slightly less. In RU two teams have just gone bust while Bristol are 50m and Saracens 42m in the red. Football .... Wigan Latics are 15m in debt since they came out of admin which is very worrying for them.
Even prem clubs are in huge debt Man U 800m world wide Barcelona 1.1billion
Even American football with joint debts of 5billion and so on.

[widdenoldboy]

No sports clubs really make money.
Our debts 9m are mainly to ourselves or in reality Ian Lenegan we also took advantage of government covid loan for clubs around 1.8 milion with not much interest. To put it in real terms Saints have debts of double ours and lost more over covid period of two years than we did even though they got money for stadium use for SL and vaccination centre. Leeds more wire slightly less. In RU two teams have just gone bust while Bristol are 50m and Saracens 42m in the red. Football .... Wigan Latics are 15m in debt since they came out of admin which is very worrying for them.
Even prem clubs are in huge debt Man U 800m world wide Barcelona 1.1billion
Even American football with joint debts of 5billion and so on.

Seems like the RFL would be better off getting even more into debt What a crazy world we live in

[lucky 13]

Whichever way you look at it until Bateman is replaced and we know the quantity he is replaced with then we are worse off.

Barring Farrell even a 70% bateman is probably our 2nd best back rower and a senior seasoned international winner- so if we dont replace him we are weaker and if we end up with a "project" player we will be weaker.

From the outside looking in it doesnt seem he gelled with the team and the environment the way he did first stint but only those in the dressing room will know if thats true or not.

Personally i dont think we need to replace him in the back row this year i think we could manage with what we have. If i were to strengthen us id be looking at 2 positions either

- an out and out 13 with ball playing skills and size (quite rare admittedly)

- a senior hooker to play spelled with Powell and provide cover in terms of injury, add to this i would send O'neill out on loan as i think he needs lots of game time to develop which he wont get at Wigan and he could end up like Jake shorrocks going deep into his 20's without ever having a run of games

I would agree in the backrow on the field we are maybe worse off but we are potentially in a much stronger position in the centres which should more than balance things up. I also agree Batty wasn't the same to an outside eye with the team and fans this time so off field and to a degree on it it's not feeling like the same blow first time he left. Smith Byrne Smithies all made big strides as the season went on I think Havards already pretty good and all should kick on further. I would if needed give Shorrocks a go as back up if we need he's never got a real go in his best position, when Faz had to play middle he's not really done much so maybe Joe could show why he was such a good player at youth level in his best position. O'niel I think stays and plays more minutes. If we do bring players in I can't see it being a 9 though it's a position we need to get something different in over next few years though O'Neil could be that.
A ball playing middle, I think they are gold dust maybe one or two in NRL. Ellis was used a little like a take to the line pivot in his time in Aus but we have not seen it this last season. I'm a Smithies fan and can't see many better than him at the moment in the way modern 13s play if he improves again he will challenge Knowles for best 13 which for me he's already on the cusp of.
Good post by the way

[lucky 13]

Seems like the RFL would be better off getting even more into debt What a crazy world we live in

Yes it is , some will be offset against asset's Man U are still paying bonuses
I don't know situation with ours ie Robin park and if old Orrell ground is going to get any pay back I'm sure at a point something may happen. If you look at stadiums and worth they seem to be a mixture of good and bad site dependant.
I can't believe Latics are 15million in the red already, it's heading towards half of what they was when they went into admin.
I guess only Lenegan, Batty and a few more only know real reason it was left so late. Any big signing would throw this open to us wanting to sell him but don't see why we would have put out what seemed a very disgruntled press release and why only few weeks back Matty Peet was saying nothing to see. It makes him look out the loop which I'm sure he isn't.

[PJC]

The comment about sports clubs not making huge profits sounds right. Going back to Wigan at Central Park when there was a long list of “shareholders “ as listed in the programme perhaps all that was needed was to keep them happy and the ground maintained. Things are now different.
Yes this needs a new topic

[Charriots Offiah]

The comment about sports clubs not making huge profits sounds right. Going back to Wigan at Central Park when there was a long list of “shareholders “ as listed in the programme perhaps all that was needed was to keep them happy and the ground maintained. Things are now different.
Yes this needs a new topic

Those shareholders never made a penny.

[Wigan_forever1985]

I would rather us wait a season than do a knee jerk signing.

We know we will need to replace KPP next year, also Farrell will be 1 year older so signing a good 2nd row next season will on the agenda so if keeping our powder dry on Batemans money will help then maybe we should do that

I did forget about Havard when i made the 13 comment on previous thread so thats my bad, but i stand by my other comment id like to see O'Neill on loan if he isnt going to feature regular, we need to know how he will go .

If you look at what weve lost, a backrower and a senior head - so the backrower element i dont think will hurt us a massive amount in the coming year but the senior head is always a loss. However we have got a decent amount of good senior heads at the club, ISA, Farrell and Powell as a core group disregarding what you think of them as players i would say you probably wont find a better group of people in terms of calming the dressing room

its a loss dont get me wrong but our recruitment has been hit and miss so a cool head is needed i dont think it will sink the ship but it will rock it

[lucky 13]

Unless we do sign a hooker I can't see O'niel not getting that plenty game time. Him pushing to get in is exactly what we need. If you look at ball players we could use French at Fullback and push Field into the halves, obviously as things stand it will be Smith Cust we start games with.
If we was desperate O'niel to 9 and Powel in the halves or I would rather give Astley that chance.
That's a very similar position to how Saints run, a half goes down it's probably Welsby going 6 and move someone else to one. You may say Welsby is a better 6 than Field but French is definitely the best back up 1 in SL. I would say he's in the top 3 full stop. If Miski is still here I also believe he's one of the best back up wings which is another plus over Saints. They pull it back with Hurrell though saints two first choice centers are a worry injury wise so you could say Hurrell is first choice. We have not seen it much yet but running a French Field Smith Cust 1, 6, 7 and 9 respectively combo may be very good. Centre cover we will have Thornley and Isa who could both also cover right second row if KPP goes down. KPP replacing Bateman is about as good as we could do from a British SL player. For me I still believe while still maybe a dominant middle shy this squads better balanced and I agree no panic is needed to replace Batty.