Re: Matty smith joins Wigan - Official : Mon Jul 09, 2012 10:21 am  

Jeff the God of Biscuits wrote:

This is you opinion, but please don't present it as fact. There is no way to tell how our current team would go against the Wigan or SL teams of the past. I think we'd be competitive and they would be good games, we may even come out on top, due to the current teams superior fitness.

The game has evolved, players are fitter these days and coached more stringently. When people say it was so much better back then, they are probably right entertainment wise, but now the players are much more professional.

It has happened in all sports, look at football, Spain won the Euros playing no striker, could you imagine the Brazil 1970 side doing that? It doesn't make one better or worse than the other as there is no definitive answer to who would win, I think Spain, my dad thinks Brazil.

Re: Matty smith joins Wigan - Official : Mon Jul 09, 2012 10:25 am  

Northampton_Saint wrote:

Utter nonsense - the Wigan of Farrell, Radlinski, Paul, Connolly etc. would chop the current Pie team (and anyone else currently in SL) into tiny little pieces, never mind the various Saints and Bradford teams there've been post '95. The current Wigan team may be fitter and better drilled than most of the better SL teams from the last 15 years, but would be inferior in every other possible department by a very considerable margin. Stop kidding yourself.

Do you really discount better fitness and better organisation so readily? I doubt most modern SL coaches would.

Also, to compare the current Wigan side to other good sides in the SL era and describe them as "inferior in every other possible department by a very considerable margin" is a huge and frankly ridiculous exaggeration.

In the current Wigan team, Sam Tomkins, Josh Charnley, George Carmont, Pat Richards (when fit), Sam Tomkins, Brett Finch, Jeff Lima, Mike McIlorum, Gareth Hock, Harrison Hansen and Sean O'Loughlin would all have comfortably found first-team berths in and around the Wigan, Saints and Bradford teams that you think so highly of.

Purely on the basis that your lot signed Bryn Hargreaves in 2007, I'd argue that Lee Mossop, Gil Dudson and Paul Prescott would also have got into the St Helens team.

Re: Matty smith joins Wigan - Official : Mon Jul 09, 2012 10:28 am  

Cruncher wrote:

Do you really discount better fitness and better organisation so readily? I doubt most modern SL coaches would.

Also, to compare the current Wigan side to other good sides in the SL era and describe them as "inferior in every other possible department by a very considerable margin" is a huge and frankly ridiculous exaggeration.

In the current Wigan team, Sam Tomkins, Josh Charnley, George Carmont, Pat Richards (when fit), Sam Tomkins, Brett Finch, Jeff Lima, Mike McIlorum, Gareth Hock, Harrison Hansen and Sean O'Loughlin would all have comfortably found first-team berths in and around the Wigan, Saints and Bradford teams that you think so highly of.

Purely on the basis that your lot signed Bryn Hargreaves in 2007, I'd argue that Lee Mossop, Gil Dudson and Paul Prescott would also have got into the St Helens team.

Sam is THAT good!

Re: Matty smith joins Wigan - Official : Mon Jul 09, 2012 10:31 am  

[Gareth] wrote:

Sam is THAT good!

Meant to put Tommy L.

Re: Matty smith joins Wigan - Official : Mon Jul 09, 2012 11:08 am  

Northampton_Saint wrote:

Utter nonsense - the Wigan of Farrell, Radlinski, Paul, Connolly etc. would chop the current Pie team (and anyone else currently in SL) into tiny little pieces, never mind the various Saints and Bradford teams there've been post '95. The current Wigan team may be fitter and better drilled than most of the better SL teams from the last 15 years, but would be inferior in every other possible department by a very considerable margin. Stop kidding yourself.

They could be better but as Wigan showed in 2010 fitness is key. That team were almost the same as the team that won nothing under Noble. Organisation and fitness won that league for Wigan.

However, if the team you mentioned were in their prime and playing now with the current fitness and organisation we have at Wigan you're right it would probably beat the current team as well as every other team.

The scary thing is how far your team has fallen since the times when Long and KC were in their prime that team in their prime today would take your current team to the cleaners but that's not where we are fitness and organisation is key now. Wigan have it in spades but the difference Wigan has is it still has a few players that do their own thing and make their own chances. Sam, Mossop, Finch all being that way. And charnley would still get into a squad with all those greats too.

Re: Matty smith joins Wigan - Official : Mon Jul 09, 2012 11:31 am  

Cruncher wrote:

Do you really discount better fitness and better organisation so readily? I doubt most modern SL coaches would.

...and, naturally, you're completely missing the point... Noone's arguing fitness and organisation is better now - that has nothing to do with the point...

The point is that basic player quality is in steep decline in SL right now and that is incontrovertible fact.

You go kid yourself that Matty Smith is the next Sean Long, Charnley is the reincarnation of Robinson, Carmont would have graced any RL team ever etc. etc. if you like. Personally I'll just live in the real world and get fed up that Saints' current squad, despite being a hollow shell of 5/10 years ago in any vague measure of quality, is still in real terms at about the same level of competitiveness. That simple fact says all that needs saying.

Re: Matty smith joins Wigan - Official : Mon Jul 09, 2012 11:34 am  

hula89 wrote:

The scary thing is how far your team has fallen since the times when Long and KC were in their prime

....and yet we're still in the same position in the league with the same chance of winning silverware every season with the same level of competitiveness against the teams there are around us now as then.

Thanks for proving my point for me

Re: Matty smith joins Wigan - Official : Mon Jul 09, 2012 11:42 am  

Northampton_Saint wrote:

....and yet we're still in the same position in the league with the same chance of winning silverware every season with the same level of competitiveness against the teams there are around us now as then.

Thanks for proving my point for me

So, correct me if i'm wrong, you think Saints are capable, this season, of doing a double or treble as they have done in the recent past?

Re: Matty smith joins Wigan - Official : Mon Jul 09, 2012 11:44 am  

bazdev wrote:

The game has evolved, players are fitter these days and coached more stringently. When people say it was so much better back then, they are probably right entertainment wise, but now the players are much more professional.

It has happened in all sports, look at football, Spain won the Euros playing no striker, could you imagine the Brazil 1970 side doing that? It doesn't make one better or worse than the other as there is no definitive answer to who would win, I think Spain, my dad thinks Brazil.

There's a big difference - there are many, many brilliant individual football players still being produced all around the world and many of the current Spain squad would have walked into that Brazil team on basic talent and ability with or without current fitness levels and professionalism. The difference in SL is that the brilliant, exciting individual players produced in the British game of 10/20 years just simply aren't there any more, and fitness and organisation is no substitute...

Re: Matty smith joins Wigan - Official : Mon Jul 09, 2012 11:45 am  

Northampton_Saint wrote:

....and yet we're still in the same position in the league with the same chance of winning silverware every season with the same level of competitiveness against the teams there are around us now as then.

Thanks for proving my point for me

Saints are well behind the standard of the Long, KC, Sculthorpe days. You could put this argument to any club. At the start of the season, all clubs have a chance of competing for silverware. The fact is its years since you won any!