As it stands....



Lomax/Wellens

Makinson

Shenton

Meli

Foster

Hohaia <officially signed as a 6>

Lomax/<are there any standby scrum halfs>





Perry <if capable of starting a game>

Roby

Laffranchi

Wilkin

Clough / Wellens <if denounced from full back>

TP



Moore <if not in bother>

LMS

Magennis

Wheels <token back>





Do we need more signings or do we offer new deals to Flannery, Pryce & Gardener?

You've missed Soliola. Wheeler will be injured for next season.

Looking at the list and it's dire in terms of strength in depth. Any injuries anywhere and we're down to the bare bones. Teams like Wigan, Wire, Huddersfield, Hull have 20-22 senior players or younger players that are already good enough. We don't have 17.



I'd like to see us resign all of Flannery, Gardner and Pryce. If we don't we'll be massively lacking in depth next year, even worse than we are this.

I think we will line-up something similar to:



Wellens, Gardner, Shenton, Meli, Foster, Hohaia, Lomax, Perry, Roby, Laffranchi, Soliola, Wilkin, TP.



Clough, LMS, Flannery, Wheeler



However, I would personally like to see:



Lomax, Gardner, Shenton, Meli, Foster, Pryce, Hohaia, Perry, Roby, Laffranchi, Soliola, Wilkin, Wellens



TP, Clough, LMS, Wheeler

Give over.



So Hull have "20-22 senior players or younger players that are already good enough" and "we don't have 17", yet we're sat 6 points clear of them despite having so many injuries.



Reverse the positions and put a fit/happy Eastmond/Pryce into the Saints side and take Brough/Brown out of the Hudds halves (and Tomkins/Deacon from Wigan and Briers/Myler from Wire) all season and how do you think the table would look?



Don't exaggerate so much, you make decent points when you're being sensible.

Wigan's bench this season is likely to feature:



Hock

Lima

Fielden

Hansen/Farrell



Can we really compete with that, this or next season without at least 2, if not 4 signings?

I'm not exaggerating. Our squad depth isn't good enough. For about the last 6 or 7 years we have released signed fewer players into the club than we have released. The difference being made up by academy products all the time. I might be wrong, but I just get the feeling if you listed the number of experienced players in each squad, we'd have the least. Might be because we've had 5.16 out per game this season mind.

Why not for goodness sake?



A pack of Perry/Roby/Laffranchi/Soliola/Wilkin/Flannery with a bench of TP/LMS/Clough/Wheeler is good enough to mix it with any team, including the unbeatable (as they apparently now are) Wigan.

There was a thread about this exact subject from 2011, created around June 2010 where we discuss this exact subject. I mention our weak squad depth and Wheeler being a biscuit and how he won't play 12 games and Blobby guarantees he'll play 20.

Our bench next season could be LMS, TP, Clough, Wheeler/Pryce.



In short, of course we can bloody compete!! To suggest we need 4 signings just to have a competitive bench is complete and utter nonsense.



I know your name gives a lot away, and fortunately I have not had the misfortune of reading all of your 17000+ posts, but you really are the most depressing person I have ever come across.

I think you lot are in denial. We're not as good as the top 3 sides and need to improve both on the field and in terms of squad quality and depth if we're to catch them.

Saddened! my little sweetpea, you are getting a tad hysterical. We don't have the right attitude this season and we have two inexperienced halfbacks. But our pack, if complete (including Scott Moore whose feistiness we really miss), is a match for any other pack in the league, without exception, so long as each member of it turns up to a game with the right attitude. Oh, and remembers their basic skills of how to catch a ball. Probably the two are connected, actually. Catching the ball requires focus, something our team is sadly lacking at present.