Cruncher wrote:
Without having read the whole of this thread, I should draw everyone's attention to a comment attributed to Shaun Edwards in today's Times, which goes something along the lines of him waiting on Wasps' offer in case he gets offered the England job.
That surely answers quite a few questions.
If the England job was suddenly dangled like a carrot, it's no wonder he turned his back on any agreement he might have reached with Wigan (and he must have reached one - he wasn't forced to participate in that press conference at gunpoint).
Maybe Wigan were not at fault for not tying him to a written contract - assuming they didn't - but really, what good have written contracts done in recent years? If a player or coach want out, that's all that seems to matter.
Could it be that Edwards doesn't sign a contract because of the legalities/compensation involved if Lam was a roaring success?
If Lam had cleaned up this year (obviously he can no longer do the quadruple or the treble for that matter) and with hindsight it looks silly to suggest we'd ever have been capable of that now but going off this assumption before a ball was kicked would tying Edwards to a deal and then us potentially sticking with Lam as Head Coach going forward result in a big pay-off for Edwards for essentially nothing? If he put pen to paper this surely would be the case?
It doesn't seem so ridiculous to suggest this as not too long after the deal was announced Edwards said he'd happily stand aside in the best interests of the club if Lam was successful and Lenagan himself said it'd be a nice dilemma for Wigan to have. In this scenario there'd be significant calls from a good percentage of fans to retain Lam.
The plan was clearly for Edwards to come in for 3 years after Lam passes the baton from Wane to Edwards but because of the uniqueness of the arrangement it seems as if they have left it open-ended as if it could always be subject to change. Again, I imagine this would be to save £££ on any potential pay-out to Edwards had we kept Lam?
For all we know Lenagan could've had a set date in his own mind of when the contract was going to be put on the table after the handshake agreement and he was happy that Edwards would stick to this verbally agreed commitment until the contract was put forward.
It seems naive to let this rumble on for 9 months without signing him to a contract however and now it seems as if either Edwards is trying to force the club's hand to get this boxed off or he has simply got cold feet/changed his mind whilst waiting.
