Point taken and amended.

Oh Wigans reserves won 34 -6 , something Leeds reserves have failed to do this season.

Ours were all in our 1st team. Yours are being groomed for a career at Huddersfield

Actually, seriously interested, how many did you have Saturday?

Well, I can't pretend to totally certain who the Wigan academy products were, but I estimate 5 in the starting line up, and 7 or 8 (?Hansen) in the 17.

Richards, Roberts, Bailey, Carmont, Ainscough, S. Tomkins, Leuluai, Fielden, Riddell, Paleaaesina, Hock, J. Tomkins, O'Loughlin. Replacements: Coley , McIlorum for , O'Carroll , Hansen ?

Leeds would probably have about 9 in a full strngth squad.

FWIW, I think Wigan are starting to take note and use some products of their academy a bit more. Hopefully they'll hang onto a few more of this crop.

Eight, and they've had that number in all games this season, bar the opener v Wakefield.

Don't believe some of the cr@p you read.

Not dissagreeing with you on the defence, I too think at times it has been awesome. Although, i dont know if you went or not yesterday, but there is a good chance that had warrington not been low on confidence and a winning team, that they would have scored a fair few try's yesterday. Had the passes stuck, which usually does happen when you are high on confidence.

Had that been the case I doubt either of us would have been complementing the defence yesterday.

got to agree with all of this!

my thoughts until i got to G's post was defence win matches and most of all titles, its no good scoring 30 if you ship 40 so what's peoples problem and that wire fan knows dick! we have the best defence in the league and it looks to have got better this year. i love the defencive aspect of the game more than attack some im buzzing so far. our cover defence was top notch again.

did we not nil wire in the second half??

Although Leeds did well in defence in the 2nd half a lot of Wire passes didnt stick (when they'd cut us open) at crucial times in the first half. Had their execution been better they'd have more than likely won the game and had this game been 4 weeks down the line and Smith had done his usual job of back to basics I think they'd certainly have won (had the game panned out the same). It wasnt and they didn't.

However, champion sides ride their luck and have the ability to go up the other end and pinch it and thats what we did. You could see how much the Mcguire try meant to the whole team by their celebrations.

If I was a Wire fan I'd be pleased with the performance but disappointed with the result.

Leeds have got plenty left in the tank but discipline and ball control need work!

No. We went in at half time 14-10

I don't but don't get too carried away. Noble has a stated predilection for veteran players. His hand has been forced somewhat because of your start to the season but he won't take much persuading to drop the kids back to reserve grade or even ship them out.

Tomkins looks very, very assured. Looking forward to seeing him Friday.

OK I hope you continue to make use of your academy and not ship them off and replace them with aussies as you have done in the past.

There is alot to be said about developing as a team together over the years and I just wonder how much better off you would be if you had't of let so many of your good academy products go?

Yes our reserves arn't doing too well at the moment but that is because our academy players are busy being top of the Super League