He took the job in 2005 after Betts 'departed'.
I think the truth is that we lost a lot of quality and experienced players due to Whelan and Lindsay losing interest. At the same time Latics were on the charge into the Premiership so maybe that was the distraction.
We also had the unfortunate passing of Mike Gregory in 2004 and Denis Betts having to fill his shoes.
I don't think anyone at the club had a plan, or any idea how and when to replace our ageing squad. At the end of 2004 we lost Lam (into coaching), O'Connor, C.Smith, Cassidy, Connolly and Farrell. Midway through 2005 we lost Radlinski and Lockers did his ACL. Davico played 5 minutes of a pre-season friendly.
We replaced some incredible quality with bang average or youth players:
Lam - Moran
O'Connor - Seu Seu
Smith - Guisset/Hargreaves
Cassidy - Hansen/Allen/Wild
Connolly - Wild/Brown
Farrell - Beswick/Wild/Hansen
For me the wheels already started to come off towards the end of 2004. Farrell had moved to prop after a lot of injuries and was still carrying us around the pitch. We were lucky in 2 play-off games and then deservedly got hammered by Leeds.
Millward was obviously a good coach and got the best out of Saints but the style of play he wanted - that Saints played so well - we just didn't have the quality or pace at all, especially in the halves.
There was a lot of rumours around the time of him losing the dressing room, a lot of unprofessional attitudes and some other shady things going on but I think that just points back to the lack of experience we had and a 'changing of the guard' culture where the kids sort of took over.
It's hard to say whether Noble actually had that much of an effect on us in 2006. Most fans agree/think it was the signing of Dobson and then Fielden that got us out of a hole. After Noble came, we beat Huddersfield and then lost the next 6 games. I dread to think where we would be now without Dobson and Fielden (and Bryan Fletcher who was massively underrated and I think scored 9 tries in the last 12 games). Thankfully Cas and Wakefield were just as poop as us but I think our fans take most of the credit. The momentum those atmospheres gave us to get out of relegation was incredible. Watching the games back sends shivers down my spine.