Grudgingly pleased for young half-back Smith - he has endured a couple of tough seasons, was heavily criticised by the fans but has bounced back with some good performances.

Compare the backing, support and patience he has had compared with Dean, who is a far more skilful player, and who was bounced out of the team and publically called out by his coach.

Had leulai not been injured Smith would’ve not have got a sniff, same goes with O’Neill. Both better than their average elders. All clubs/managers play it safe

Errrrrrm Just been looking at the Fixtures on Sky sports and all they have down is our Game against leeds on Friday, then the next game on 1st July... Surely that can't be right???

Away at Wakefield Sun 12th June
Home to Hull FC Fri 24th June

Those must be the Sky games

I think it was about RL games on the TV this weekend in general not our games per se

Ahh, I see. Yes, Sky not reporting any further upcoming fixtures until July. Seems strange, maybe just a glitch.

I thought it was quite a poor final really. Low quality and error-strewn, and only exciting by virtue of the score remaining close throughout. Not that Wigan will care, and nor should they. Most reports probably said that Wigan won it in the last few minutes, but the biggest factor in them winning it was probably their defence in the first half, when Huddersfield had enough possession and territory to win two games but failed to make the most of it. I thought James Child had a decent game, although Smithies was lucky to not be sin-binned for either/both of his head shots, as was whichever Huddersfield player hit Farrell late on (not even a penalty given for that one!).

i thought it was a case of huddersfield losing it rather than wigan winning, if that were a thing

Agreed!

I thought the tactics from Huddersfield were so negative. How many times did they surrender possession on the 5th without putting a kick in or any sort of attacking play? It seemed they were determined to hang on to their slender lead.

I get the idea, hand the ball over as close to your line as possible, negating French and field as kick returns in a broken field, or the chance of a kick going dead and getting 7 tackle restart.

As you say, can't sit on such a slender lead like that