Fri 14th Jul: Wigan Warriors v Warrington Wolves KO 20:00 (Sky)

[Dunbar]

41 minutes ago, graveyard johnny said:

I was a fan of Dufty but now I bet the dragons and bulldogs chipped in for his taxi to Sydney airport

Dufty has done better than I expected. 

He is less than a speed bump as a last line of defence but he has been solid under the high ball and dangerous running the ball.

I remain convinced that he is not the type of player that you win Grand Finals with but he has been far from the worst Warrington player this year.

[GUBRATS]

43 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I'm OK with my props being stupid. I get a bit fed up of centres, wingers, halves etc. being so stupid. 

But you just know there'll be 4/5 brainfarts a game that will cost you a couple of 6s be that in defence or attack , and in anything like a close game it will cost you the win 

[Dave T]

18 minutes ago, GUBRATS said:

But you just know there'll be 4/5 brainfarts a game that will cost you a couple of 6s be that in defence or attack , and in anything like a close game it will cost you the win 

I don't disagree, but tonight was the same as most losses. All tactics and attack. Our forwards are doing enough. Our backs are toothless. 

[WN83]

Horror start defensively by us but we managed to pull it around. We’re well off our best and have been for 90% of the season but there’s time to turn it on yet. 

[JohnM]

5 hours ago, bobbruce said:

There’s one in the stand one in the centres and one just been sent out on loan. 

You very much missed the one in the stand, too..

[Dave T]

I must admit, I enjoy Brian Carney's presence on Sky's coverage. He cuts through much of the BS. He called it as it was, that Wire were poor again and dismissed Powell's complaints about injuries, rightly pointing out that clubs don't have a right to their first 17.

When Tomkins said they only needed Williams back, he rightly pointed out that we were losing these games with Williams too.

Somebody needs to cut through the BS with Wire. This all feels like when we had James Lowes as manager. 

[Barry Badrinath]

9 hours ago, Dunbar said:

Dufty has done better than I expected. 

He is less than a speed bump as a last line of defence but he has been solid under the high ball and dangerous running the ball.

I remain convinced that he is not the type of player that you win Grand Finals with but he has been far from the worst Warrington player this year.

You must have had very very low expectations for him.

 

Powell said he was trying to emulate wigan with field and French by getting some pure pace, but he's been a bystander for the majority of this year. He's not nimble enough to create anything for himself bar the odd kick return but those are few and far between, he's not a good link man to our terrible centres, and spends far too much time getting angry for getting tackled

[Harry Stottle]

21 minutes ago, Dave T said:

Somebody needs to cut through the BS with Wire. This all feels like when we had James Lowes as manager. 

Has he left?

It doesn't look like he has!

[Dunbar]

11 minutes ago, Barry Badrinath said:

You must have had very very low expectations for him.

I did.

[Dave T]

I don't think Dufty has been an issue at all for us. Sure, he has weaknesses, but he was great for the early parts when the team played well, and if you make a half break you want him in support. 

He gets plenty of stick, but his stats with the ball broadly hold up, he makes plenty of carries and metres (5th in SL). 

He may be a bit of a luxury player, but tbh, there are a handful of other things that need fixing before we start thinking fullback is our issue. 

Edited July 15, 2023 by Dave T

[bobbruce]

5 hours ago, JohnM said:

You very much missed the one in the stand, too..

Did I?. 

[Just Browny]

16 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I don't think Dufty has been an issue at all for us. Sure, he has weaknesses, but he was great for the early parts when the team played well, and if you make a half break you want him in support. 

He gets plenty of stick, but his stats with the ball broadly hold up, he makes plenty of carries and metres (5th in SL). 

He may be a bit of a luxury player, but tbh, there are a handful of other things that need fixing before we start thinking fullback is our issue. 

I basically agree, Dufty was pretty good last night. He was our only long distance running threat with the ball and made a few decent half breaks. Trouble with being the only threat is it means the opposition can put all its resources into shutting you down, whereas with Thewlis, Ashton and even Wrench on the field it is much harder.

[JohnM]

9 minutes ago, bobbruce said:

Did I?. 

Sorry. Warrington very much missed Williams.

[Dave T]

10 minutes ago, Just Browny said:

I basically agree, Dufty was pretty good last night. He was our only long distance running threat with the ball and made a few decent half breaks. Trouble with being the only threat is it means the opposition can put all its resources into shutting you down, whereas with Thewlis, Ashton and even Wrench on the field it is much harder.

Yup. The start of the year saw us with a monster pack doing their job well and some electric pace playing off the back of it. Our centres have been poor all year, but Nicholson and Currie covered that to a large degree. 

We've been a car crash since we've had to shuffle and that is a huge flaw in a squad if you can't handle some players missing. 

[EagleEyePie]

I thought the Wigan pack outplayed the Wire pack last night, which must be a bit of a concern if you're a Wire fan because our middles were rolled over relatively easily by Wakefield last week. There are some good players in that team and Clark caused problems at hooker like he always does, but I'm really not sure how Powell is trying to get his team to play. They really did seem to play like individuals last night rather than a team. There are players capable of making strong carries and they did, but on the back of that there seemed to be no one who knew what the next move was.

From a Wigan point of view we weren't great but considering the issues we've had with our front row there are definitely far more positives than negatives. Both Wire tries came from our props getting exposed too easily. The first try Byrne (who had a bit of a shocker) was caught out and the second try Mago exposed in the back row channel. On the whole our defensive performance was quite good.

Pearce-Paul had a really strong game at prop. I was a bit wary of him playing there as he got exposed a bit the last time he was playing down the middle, but considering he's been out injured for a while that was an outstanding effort. I think he has to remain at prop for the next few weeks now.

Despite getting caught out defensively Mago had one of his better games and was making strong carries and playing extended minutes. It's not perfect but it's a step in the right direction.

[Man of Kent]

What would worry me if I was a Warrington fan is how disorganised they look.

I find it baffling how a full time team of well paid pros can look so much like a bunch of strangers at times. 

It’s not good enough for a club their size in an elite competition to become such a rabble with one player to be missing (Williams). It’s a team game, players can’t do it by themselves. 

[Dave T]

13 minutes ago, EagleEyePie said:

I thought the Wigan pack outplayed the Wire pack last night, which must be a bit of a concern if you're a Wire fan because our middles were rolled over relatively easily by Wakefield last week. 

I haven't seen the stats, but I'm not sure I agree with this part. Our forwards were fine, broadly speaking. In the first half we made more metres despite Wigan having more ball. 

Wigan exposed us badly out wide, including a couple of long range tries. 

[GeordieSaint]

13 minutes ago, Dave T said:

Yup. The start of the year saw us with a monster pack doing their job well and some electric pace playing off the back of it. Our centres have been poor all year, but Nicholson and Currie covered that to a large degree. 

We've been a car crash since we've had to shuffle and that is a huge flaw in a squad if you can't handle some players missing. 

That pack was outplayed last night. I hadn’t even realised Vaughan was playing initially. But it appears the root cause is the coaching. Was Wrench injured or not selected? Why has Dean not been called back from loan? 

[Dave T]

Just now, GeordieSaint said:

That pack was outplayed last night. I hadn’t even realised Vaughan was playing initially. But it appears the root cause is the coaching. Was Wrench injured or not selected? Why has Dean not been called back from loan? 

See my last post, I disagree the pack was outplayed. 

People keep using the commentary about Vaughan after every game, yet he is still the biggest metre-making forward in the league. 

[Dave T]

14 minutes ago, Man of Kent said:

What would worry me if I was a Warrington fan is how disorganised they look.

I find it baffling how a full time team of well paid pros can look so much like a bunch of strangers at times. 

It’s not good enough for a club their size in an elite competition to become such a rabble with one player to be missing (Williams). It’s a team game, players can’t do it by themselves. 

Agreed. And its clear the coach is out if ideas. The mish-mash of halves is just weird. 

[Dave T]

Stats show that Paul Vaughan made more metres than any other forward on display last night. 

Only Dufty and Marshall made more metres than him. 

[EagleEyePie]

9 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I haven't seen the stats, but I'm not sure I agree with this part. Our forwards were fine, broadly speaking. In the first half we made more metres despite Wigan having more ball. 

Wigan exposed us badly out wide, including a couple of long range tries. 

That's fair in terms of making metres, but I'd include defence in the equation too, and I thought it was surprising how much ground Wigan were able to make down the middle running at the Wire forwards. With players like Vaughan and Kasiano you're bound to make some strong carries but I didn't think they were as effective as they could have been. On the whole Wigan contained them fairly well even if they were making ground.

When we had Pearce-Paul and Mago on the field at prop Wigan were on top. Surely that's a little concerning given KPP is a makeshift middle and Mago is a player surplus to requirements.

Maybe things were a little more even than I thought but I certainly think Wigan got much more out of our middles last night than in previous games.

[Dave T]

1 minute ago, EagleEyePie said:

That's fair in terms of making metres, but I'd include defence in the equation too, and I thought it was surprising how much ground Wigan were able to make down the middle running at the Wire forwards. With players like Vaughan and Kasiano you're bound to make some strong carries but I didn't think they were as effective as they could have been. On the whole Wigan contained them fairly well even if they were making ground.

When we had Pearce-Paul and Mago on the field at prop Wigan were on top. Surely that's a little concerning given KPP is a makeshift middle and Mago is a player surplus to requirements.

Maybe things were a little more even than I thought but I certainly think Wigan got much more out of our middles last night than in previous games.

I'm certainly not being critical of Wigan forwards or downplaying their efforts, but I think if we step back and look at the balance of the game, the territory, possession and where the scored came from, I don't think there was a dominant pack. Both teams scored two tries from close range, the difference was Wigan's ability to actually do something in attack with the ball, all four of your tries coming from decent/slick link play.

My high level view is that the packs both did their job. Wigan's backs also did their job, whereas Wire's were awful in attack and defence. 

It's quite a simplistic breakdown, but our backs probably still wouldn't have scored had we still been playing now! 

[WN83]

1 hour ago, Just Browny said:

I basically agree, Dufty was pretty good last night. He was our only long distance running threat with the ball and made a few decent half breaks. Trouble with being the only threat is it means the opposition can put all its resources into shutting you down, whereas with Thewlis, Ashton and even Wrench on the field it is much harder.

I thought Dufty was good last night. He caused us problems and took some really tough high balls. I thought Wire on the whole were better than recent months but you’re right in that missing Wrench, Thewlis and Ashton hurt you. Guys like Minikin shouldn’t be playing for a first team at Warrington and as good as his career has been, Ratchford offers very little threat nowadays and nor does Matautia. I’m not at all surprised you’re getting King back. 

[sentoffagain2]

25 minutes ago, Dave T said:

Stats show that Paul Vaughan made more metres than any other forward on display last night. 

Only Dufty and Marshall made more metres than him. 

   Thought Drinkwater was AWOL again.He dosn't like it when it's tough.