JTB wrote:
Bill McCracken...
Is that Bill McCracken from Standish? He was the highlight of the evening.
Overall is was good, they advised the fans on what they could do at this time.
I was pleased to Roberts there, although he looked very jet lagged which isnt surprised based on him landing yesterday morning.
I'll agree with whats posted above, some of the Wigan fans are just plain embarrasing and thick. The same questions about the usage of the JJB kept getting asked time and time again, you could clearly see IL pulling his face each time the question was asked. Fans need to get through there thick heads that we lease the stadium, we are second fiddle in terms of usage of it, thats a fact, as annoying as it may be, its fact.
IL clearly showed fans that in the 2009 squad we have 19 UK players of which 15 of them are from Wigan. And yet 4 or 5 people asked the same question 'why do we have a team full of overseas' we clearly dont. Once again fans showing that they do not know anything about our club.
I was surprised that we didnt get a preview of the kit, this would have made a number of people happy. But as MH mentioned, it will be shown to us a week on friday, i presume a few days after the sponsors are mentioned.
Pemps was blamed for ruining a multi-million sponsorship with pirtek after showing the sponsor on the kit he designed
It was interesting to see that within 12-18 months we should have an agreement with an NRL club to send players over on loan and vice-versa with players from thr NRL coming over her for a year. IL mentioned that St George would be an ideal club to get a partnership with.
Noble spoke excellently, he made it clear of what the players are up against, and what we need to do to break the top 2 positions. They work on a rule of '1 less & 1 more' which based on last season means, we concede 1 less try per game and score 1 more try per game we would finish in the top 3 without doubt. He is happy with the side, although we are a little short within the half backs which will see Tomkins play some good game time in 2009. IL mentioned that he is still looking for that 'enforcer' prop forward, but what they do not want to do is risk letting players such as O'Barrell and Prescott leave to get this player.
They confirmed that they had looked at signed Todd Carney, but the transfer fee they wanted was far to much. He also confirmed that we have put a bid in for Greg Bird, but he doesnt expect it to be excepted. We aqre currently £20,000 under the cap for 2009, the departure of Barrett had free'd up money, but they have invested most of this into the young lads such as Tomkins, Mossop etc.
One thing that did annoy me, is that IL admitted that the game against Saints could not be played if GF was his fault. Wigan did not request to the stadium management in enough time that they needed to use the stadium on GF.