I completely agree with this. He, Gardner and Wello are now our longest serving players. Wello just throws his hands around and sulks when anything goes wrong - useless for a captain - and Gardner is three sheets to the wind on most occasions. Wilko is the only one who has what it takes. For me, make him joint captain and charge him with the responsibility of leading the team. Make it official.

that is the best advert for buying a Saints season ticket I ever heard....you might as well play behind close doors for 6 months.

Oh joy. Even if it was trolling, yesterday's 'required attitude adjustment' has made that comment far more hilarious.

You won't get any arguments from me on that one. Superleague might as well be played behind closed doors these days.

Most people on here know my opinion on Jon wilkin in that I don't think he's a top class but I gave him plenty of praise last year and thought he was the best backrow in super league.



Im pretty shocked people are now calling him for the way he's playing this year, he's been like this for most of the past 6 years!



Obviously last years form was for new contract.

In terms of leadership though it's a narrow field and Wilkin is the obvious choice, if he is not the best choice to lead us who is. But the monkey has a good point too. A leader on the field can only implement what the general has ordered. So Lomax maybe playing the calls he's been told to, the fact they are not good enough plays does not mean they are being implemented incorrectly.

Individual plays during the course of the match when facing an opposition by nature unpredictable are not going to be called by the coach. That is the job of the leader on the pitch. Normally that would likely be the scrum half, in terms of playmaking anyway, but ours is too inexperienced and prone to panic.



Wilkin has the most nous on the pitch now and is one of the most experienced players. He should step up and do the business and the players should listen to him.

He's not doing a very good job then and should take his fair share of the blame.

To be honest, if Wilkin possessed the kind of leadership qualities we need right now he'd have exhibited at least some evidence of such throughout his playing career. Yes, he has assumed kicking responsibilities in the past. But mostly in isolated games. He has never shown sufficient consistency to warrant kicking duties over extended periods - as Paul Sculthorpe did on numerous occasions. He is a reliable third option who functions best working alongside better players.



I'm skeptical whether - at this stage of his career - he can change his game sufficiently to make a difference.



As for the wisdom of offering long-term contracts to player approaching the veteran stage of his career I'm similarly skeptical. That said, it's not like there's an endless conveyor belt of quality players to pick from.







I have some reservations about Royce's tactics. I do think we are standing far too flat. For Lomax - who I don't think is a natural scrum half - this seriously eats into his thinking time and the result is the kind of panic passes we saw on Friday night. We would be far better served standing just that little bit deeper thus giving Jonny more time to evaluate whether or not a pass is truly on.

I think that comment is a bit extreme. I think he starts to try too hard when he is not being given any options, That's the fault of the support runners and not his!!

Yes, once we're on the pitch, its the lads job to call the plays, but our problem isn't an innappropriate choice of play. We're not spreading the ball wide too early, nor is the problem that we're keeping it tight when it should go wide, we're not kicking short when we need to go long for territory. The problem is two fold - simple narrow moves close to the ruck are non existant whilst wide moves we call are slow and akward (not to mentioned having no space, thanks to the lack of narrow plays). I would suggest this is a training ground problem.

Wellens is the main issue in attack as we have to wait for him to catch up with play or attack with 12 men which makes it very easy to deal with.