Ardent Wire fan Rob Watson gives his take on Thursday's chastening defeat to neighbours Wigan.

AN in-form Wigan side probably were not ideal opponents when looking to put a losing run to an end.

In previous losses this season Wire have looked in the game and with a chance of winning it, but looking at this game, honestly it only ever looked like a Wigan win.

The Brisbane victory now seems like a long time ago and an irrelevance when it comes to this season. Wigan got on top early on and a 20-0 deficit could easily have been more such was their dominance.

A rare flash of accurate handling by Wire from just inside their own half gave Lineham a bit of space and another rarity – a mistake from Wigan in defence as their winger slipped allowing Lineham to race clear, good support from Brown and then Atkins allowed the latter to score Wire’s first try just before half time.

Any cruel hopes that the try just before half time was the start of a heroic comeback were quickly crushed by a break away try from Wigan after Gidley’s tip on pass found the ground rather than Blythe.

It was a small moment that summed up the so much of the season so far in that players didn’t seem on the same page and anything that could go wrong did go wrong.

As is often the case with a bad run of form in any sport, it seems to be lots of basic aspects that seem to be letting them down.

How to hold the ball is the first thing you teach someone, yet it seems to be done badly by so many Wire players so often at the moment.

Passing accuracy is such a vital part of any attack. Without it gaining the desired yards, creating space and making breaks is virtually impossible and at the moment, way too many passes are not finding their target.

Wire also seem to have lost their ability to make headway down the middle of the pitch, an ability that was probably their greatest asset last season.

The half breaks through tackles that lead to quick play the balls aren’t happening anything like as much as they were, and now players who you wouldn’t expect to be doing that job are running the ball away from their own line.

Defensively, the main thing missing seems to be that raw aggression and shoulder contact that was evident against Brisbane but not since.

The old maxim of whichever team runs harder and hits harder has by far the best chance of winning the game will probably hold true as long as Rugby League is played. Wire need to get back to that focus as soon as possible and then the added extras can come.

In the long term, the most worrying trait this team has is an apparent fragile confidence. Their mantra for the Brisbane game was ‘If we want to compete we have to complete’, as catchy as that is, they have to be aware that the implication is that if they don’t complete they can’t compete and ideally you want a team to build a mentality that nothing can eliminate the possibility of them winning.

At the moment they look like if things start to go wrong, a few dropped balls for example, their confidence is completely drained as if they think only perfection can result in a win.

A truly confident and resilient team is one that keeps the belief that they can win no matter how badly things are going and how far from the plan the game has gone.

A classic example of this was this year’s Super Bowl, where New England Patriots were truly awful by their standards for three quarters of the game and were being completely outplayed by Atlanta who looked better than them in every aspect.

Somehow, some way the Patriots turned it round to win their equivalent of the Grand Final.

There is a truly long way to go in this season, but the upturn in energy, execution of basic skills and a development of a deep inner confidence needs to start very soon.