You think a rival club should give you a player who is under contract?

I agree with you, had roles been reversed we would have done exactly the same.

Yeah I do. I'm not saying it shouldn't have been a transfer fee involved, but he still should have come here instead of Leigh.

Different circumstances, but we let Tomkins go to Hull KR last year. He'd practically killed his career at Wigan (like Clarke has done with Cas) and yet we still did right by him and let him go to Hull KR & didn't force him to play in the championship.

Navarrete - We loaned his back to Cats when he wasn't getting any game time.

Scott Taylor - we loaned him to Salford as Hull FC wouldn't buy him.

If we took the same stubborn approach as Cas we'd have forced all three to play in the championship as it strengthened a 'rival'.

All that's before you even get onto the topic of people moaning about players on big contracts and refusing to move when they aren't wanted - Morgan Escare anyone? Cas fans would be up in arms if the club wanted to move him on, but he refused and just picked up a paycheck for doing nothing.

The Mole 1
Phil Wilkinson 0

I’m pretty sure that Cas would have allowed him to move to Wigan if Wigan were prepared to pay a fee, but that presumably wasn’t the case.
Tomkins hardly strengthened a rival club - KR were nowhere near competing for a play-off spot with Wigan.
Navarette - didn’t he need to be close to home for a period and wasn’t getting in the Wigan team. It seemed more of a move to allow him to gain first team experience, but that would benefit Wigan in the long run. Letting someone go on loan to build experience that will have a long-term benefit is different to just letting a player leave.
Taylor - isn’t that exactly what you are arguing against? Hull wouldn’t pay a fee so Wigan let him play a year on loan at Salford, as they didn’t deem Salford to be as much of a threat as Hull? Just like we’ve let Clark join Leigh rather than Wigan. This seems to undermine your claim that Cas should ave just let Clark join Wigan early.
Ultimately, Cas and Wigan are level on points and both vying for a play-off spot. They aren’t likely to do each other any favours.

Simple fact is there could have been a stipulation that Clarke couldn’t play against Cas this season. You’ve gone from saying he’s not good enough to warrant a place in your side because your other forwards are better, to saying he’s too big a threat to your play off ambitions. Which is it?

Both. He doesn’t get in Cas’ first choice pack, but he improves Wigan’s.
I think it might go a bit deeper as well to be honest. Powell is known for ‘sending out a message’ to the rest of the squad. By not allowing Clark to join Wigan now, he’s making the point that players who sign elsewhere for the following season can’t just throw a stop and get their own way whilst they are still under contract at Cas.
Unlike Clark, Greg Minikin hasn’t acted like a spoilt brat even though he’s signed elsewhere for next year. As such, he’s kept his place in the team. Clark spat his dummy and has ended up playing at Leigh.

Well that's not true either, is it? He was playing (and playing well) in your pack and has lost his place due to a falling out with the coach, not because of form. If you're going to rewrite history you need to delete all the threads where he's getting loads of praise earlier in the season over on the Cas forum.

He did have some good games. His problem is that he’s an impact forward, so he only plays 20/25 minutes. If he does his job well and makes an impact, he stands out for the time he’s on the field. If he doesn’t, then everyone considers it to be a waste of interchanges. Powell’s approach has always been to withdraw him after ten minutes or so if he hasn’t made an impact (he’s done the same with similar players in previous seasons) as he quickly becomes a defensive liability.
In fairness I think he did lose his place because other players returned. When he was playing Cas were missing a mixture of Millington, Sene-Lafeo, McMeeken, Moors, Holmes and Cook. Most of th se players returned to fitness and offer far more than Clark, so he dropped out. Then when he did get a chance, he looked disinterested and was subbed off after 7 minutes.
I’m with Powell on this one. When Clark was subbed he stormed off and refused to leave the changing room. We had a concussion interchange late in that game and had to put a knackered Grant Millington back on when I suspect Clark would have been used if he wasn’t refusing to play. I said at the time I didn’t think we’d see him in a Cas shirt again, and so it has proved.

And were all those other players injured again when he got that second chance?