We were shocking around the ruck and were completely dominated in this area. Wigan were getting 3-4 players in on the tackle and peeling off one by one giving themselves extra time to be set in the line whereas most of our tackles were one on one with a lot of quick play the balls.



If you compared the 2 sets of forwards most of our players like to stand up in the tackle and drive for a couple more yards which really plays into Wigan's hands as it allows them to keep men in the tackle and effectively slow the play down.



Wigan's forwards hit the collision and a lot of the times look for the floor and to bounce back up for a quick play the ball.



Look how much time McIlorum had compared to Roby last night and it was obvious we were going to be struggling to compete.



I couldn't say we played particularly badly but as a team we were definitely outsmarted.

Completely agree with the OP.



We were comprehensively outplayed in every area of the field last night. Wigan did every basic facet of the game better than us.



They charged onto the ball at speed and were able to make the hard yards alot better than were. Wigan were sharper at the ruck and controlled that area MILES better than us, that allowed Wigan's forwards to make big yards and when you charge onto the ball like they did they were always going to make 10-15 yards every play the ball. We were running onto the ball at half pace and it was very reminiscent of the Warrington game earlier in the year. This is a very worrying sign as we haven't learnt our lessons. The only player that charged onto the ball for us and ran at the Wigan defensive line at speed was Jon Wilkin, who gave an excellent display. He wouldn't have been out of place in the Wigan side and it's a shame the others didn't give the same type of performance, especially when you consider he's played more minutes than anybody in the last 2 weeks. Name for name when you compare our packs, on paper you'd think we had the edge, but our pack has never really come out on top against them in the last 2 years and you've got to give credit to Maguire who is a fantastic coach. The worrying thing is, we only have Clough and Perry - who aren't exactly our top bracket forwards - to return. That's not a good sign and the forwards need to do alot more to lay a good platform for the halves and backs.



Our defence was NOWHERE near intense enough for such a big game. You cannot allow teams to bully you and dictate the play the ball. Wigan controlled us in the tackle by getting 3 or 4 men in every tackle and holding us down for several seconds allowing the defensive line to reset. We, on the otherhand gave them the advantage by tackling in ones and twos and getting off them really quickly allowing them to control the ruck area. We made Leuluai's and the Wigan forwards jobs easy because our defensive line wasn't set. We need to be more ruthless and aggressive in defence and we need to hold down for longer to allow our defensive line time to get set. At times we look so disorganised and it's because the line isn't set and the opposition have played the ball. Not only that, but we didn't move up anywhere near quickly enough to dominate in the tackle. We were waiting for Wigan to meet us at times rather than moving in and hitting them, stopping them gaining momentum. At one point we had Wigan on their line and we should've held them there, instead they made the half way line with ease. When Wigan had us on our line they generally held us there and it meant we were kicking from our 30m line. We need to show more willingness in defence and play smarter at the ruck area, otherwise Huddersfield, Warrington and Wigan will beat us EVERY time. We can't play so passive defensively and expect to beat the stronger sides.



Their kicking game was excellent and it was mainly because they were kicking from the half way line and in our half, whilst we were kicking on the 30m and 40m line. I felt for Gaskell and Wilkin (our best 2 players IMO) who took responsiblity for our kicking duties as the forwards gave them no platform at all. Wigan were returning the ball in good areas, whilst we were returning it from our own line time and time again.



Their completion rate was fantastic. I believe it was 96% in the 1st half whilst ours was just over 40%. How we expected to compete with that I do not know.



The teams were miles apart and like the Warrington game and Huddersfield game it was men against boys.

We were physically and mentally not at the races last night.



A look at Wigans trys showed it was basically a case of high kick, mistake from Saints, try to Wigan.



Gaskell was putting long kicks in that Tomkins was fielding on the 10 metre line then returning to the 30 metre line. The Wigans pack then took over.

It was noticable during the match that the Wigan forwards were rarely put on their back. This was because Saints defence was very slow at coming forward. As a result the Wigan forwards were able to gain ground quickly, and then when they came into contact with the passive Saints defence they merely dove at their feet, and got a quick play the ball. This further exacerbated Saints inability to defend as we were then on the back foot as Wigan got a quick play the ball.



One thing to note is that the first quick play the ball in Wigans set of six invariably comes from when Tomkins gets tackled.

His great agility allows him to side step while his back is virtually parallel with the ground. This means when he is tackled he is able to get a quick play the ball. The odd times he gets turtled is when he starts to use his sneaky arm and leg locks to milk penalties.



When things were on the other foot however, Wigan knew the importance of getting in Saints faces. They therefore rushed our forwards and stopped them in an upright position. This allowed them to slow our PTB down by first stopping the forward in an upright position, then slowly maneuvering him onto his back, then slowly one by one pealing away from the tackle.



As a result Wigan were making 50-60 metres in a set of 6 and were were making 30 metres



For me the fundamental difference between the teams at the moment is the quality of defensive coaching.

Overall i would regard Wigan as a well drilled efficient team, that grinds out results. They IMO lack the stars to be regarded as a great side, instead they have a great team ethic that sticks closely to a successful gameplan.

They are therefore very similar to Huddersfield in that regard, but somewhat distant from Warrington who IMO have more class in their side, but are less well structured.

I would agree with this except I'm not sure whether the defence is about coaching or about attitude. I'm still on the fence about that. But if Simmons is a poor defence coach then he needs to hand over the defensive work permanently to Purtill to see if he can make a better go of it. Either way, we were lacklustre to say the least, both in attack and defence. Only Wilkin showed what we needed to compete. The rest of our senior players were woeful, with no concentration, no drive and little effort. And you can't have 60% and 43% completion rates and hope to win a match, or even compete in one.



The team should be embarrased by that performance, although I doubt they will be. We aren't the side of 2006, but we are better than that.

Like everone else I felt down after last nights result, we seemed to be completely outplayed but haveing watched the game back on Sky+ the game did seem to turn on a couple of incidents.

The early game was a stalemate, but we mad a hash of handling three kicks which led to tries, then haveing got behind bu twenty points we had to push the passes alot and against a very good Wigan defence that led to too many dropped balls.



Wigan are well drilled and very good defensively they've got the holding in a tackle off to a fine art and we very rarely got a quick play the ball to get a roll on.



They do seem to fall off their game in the second half, if we hadn't let them get such a big lead they would have been there for the taking .

On a different day and without the disruption to the threequarter line it may have been different.

One thing, next year they won't have McGuire and thats going to be pretty big shoes to fill.