Word Club Challenge

[lonesomeloser]

Wigan Warriors vs St.George Illawarra Dragons

Venue: England

Anyone one with any thoughts on this game?

[lonesomeloser]

A few (useless) match facts for the newbies to rugby league

Match is World championship game

Wigan

English champions
Playing In season - may have fatigue, fitness advantage
Won last game 44-10 against bradford
Home field advantage
Cold conditions suits
Will probaby have ref bias (athough not sure what nationality the ref is atm)

St.George
Austraian champions
Playing out of season (in their pre season)
Won charity shield match against south sydney convincingly
Coahed by master coach wayne bennett, who will be absent for game due to family illness.

[lonesomeloser]

Squad Announced for WCC

Head Coach Michael Maguire has named his squad for Sunday's Probiz World Club Challenge match against St George Illawarra Dragons.
The only change from the squad which beat Bradford last week is Stefan Marsh who comes in for Josh Charnley.

The Wigan 19-man squad is: Sam Tomkins, Darrell Goulding, Martin Gleeson, George Carmont, Paul Deacon, Thomas Leuluai, Stuart Fielden, Michael McIlorum, Andy Coley, Harrison Hansen, Joel Tomkins, Sean O'Loughlin, Paul Prescott, Ryan Hoffman, Amos Roberts, Lee Mossop, Liam Farrell, Chris Tuson, Stefan Marsh

The St George 20-man squad is: Darius Boyd, Matt Cooper, Ben Creagh, Nick Emmett, Nathan Fien, Mark Gasnier, Ben Hornby (capt), Bronx Goodwin, Jon Green, Michael Greenfield, Dan Hunt, Trent Merrin, Brett Morris, Jason Nightingale, Matt Prior, Beau Scott, Jamie Soward, Kyle Stanley, Michael Weyman, Dean Young

[lonesomeloser]

IMO

Pick: Take St.George ML at 1.65 or better

Reasoning:

- Strength of roster: Saints have approximately 10 internationals and a couple more State of Origin payers in their squad. Unike some past Aussie teams, they have pretty much brought a full strength squad to england and look to be taking this game serious, as they should.

- St.george backline: The saints backline consists of boyd, morris, gasnier, cooper, nightingale, soward and hornby. 6 of the 7 are internationals! And the one that isn't, soward, is arguably their best and most influential player. If st.george can negate and at least break even in the forward battle then the class of this backline shoud allow saints to cause wigan a tonne of trouble, especially if gasnier get one on one with carmont. A face pass from Boyd to Morris to score the first try would not be a bad option for the first try scorer (not that i am betting on it)

- Saints kicking game: Soward has a wonderful kicking (and goalkicking) game, which is complemented by Hornby and which allows saints to dominate field possession and use their strong defense to force errors from the opposition in good field position al la the recipe for their GF victory.

- Saints Defence:Coach bennett has implemented a simple but effective and regimented defensive structure which was the best in the nrl in 2010. They also have brillant goal line defence. I also feel their defence will suit the expected wet, cold and slippery conditions. While the loss of Smith and Costigan takes away some of their defensive mongrel to upset and intimidate the opposition, their forward should still be able to break even with the poms when, not if, the warriors resort to dirty tactics with the likes of weyham and scott not likely to take a backward step if any fisitcuffs eventuate.

- Ben Creagh vs wigans edge defence: I think creagh will be able to exploit wigans left edge defence with his power and pace to get a meat pie or two.

Conclusion: Quality vs Home field, ref advantage, fitness. Athough any think can happen in these type of games, after watching saints in the charity shield they looked to be straight on the ball form last year and I feel comfortable with the squad they have that they should be able to bring the trophy back down under. My only concern is I haven't been able to watch much of wigan lately but have knowledge on most of their players and they just do not compare to the saints roster mano o mano. The other concern is that bennett is missing and will not be able to implement a half-time team talk to change things if they are losing, but the players think of their coach as an icon of the game and have came out pubicly and stated that they want to win this one for the coach (yada yada yada) and his family so the motivation looks to be there.

Cheers

[Ace_of_Spades]

Hate Rugby League. Union way better.

[lonesomeloser]

Hate Rugby League. Union way better.

Pity you do not hate hitler too

I do not hate sports, I just like winners

[lonesomeloser]

Anyone blindly tailing?

[lonesomeloser]

About to start if anybody wants to fade

[Bazz27]

Dragons win by only 6pts
got them @1.80 ML last week.. will take the lucky win n collect

[TheMoneyTree]

Dragons win by only 6pts got them @1.80 ML last week.. will take the lucky win n collect

That wasn't a lucky win, It was a VERY convincing St George Illawarra Dragons performance.

[lonesomeloser]

Pity no one had faith in lonesome or his analysis to tail him on this one.

[lonesomeloser]

Dragons win by only 6pts
got them @1.80 ML last week.. will take the lucky win n collect

Congratulation on the post post winner

Saints were far superior and the only thing that kept it close was the ref.

[TheMoneyTree]

Pity no one had faith in lonesome or his analysis to tail him on this one.

I tipped also St George in my engage Super League Thread.

[Giuvara]

1 more month and the NRL starts. I can't wait for it.