ANOTHER epic final, another shattering loss.

Yet another crushing disappointment and the well-publicised wait for a title goes on. Sports teams or players who lose in big occasions tend to get the cruel label of ‘chokers’ or get told they lack the ‘bottle’ to win the big one.

If these people really did lack the mental toughness required to win, they would shy away from the big occasions and not put themselves in a position to fail on the grandest stage of all with the eyes of the world watching them.

It’s a fact of sport that to truly go after the ultimate glory, you have to risk suffering the most heartbreaking losses. The last team to lose both major finals in the same season was Leeds in 2005, but in the 10 years after that they won six Grand Finals and two Challenge Cups.

Each setback is just a stepping stone on the way to success. Losing in finals is a nightmare, but as a fan it’s so much better than the times when merely getting to a final was a pipe dream.

Don’t shy away from the spotlight, keep searching it out. If you want to win the raffle, you have to keep buying a ticket.

The game started at a frenetic pace and it never really slowed down. Wigan had the slight edge in the opening minutes but Wire’s defence held firm, only conceding a penalty goal.

It didn’t take all that long for Wire to get a foothold in the match and start giving at least as good as they were getting.

Their high kicks caused Wigan trouble all night and, after a knock on from one of them, Wire took advantage of the great field position to score the opening try.

Clark jumped out of acting half-back to set up Patton, who did brilliantly to spot the chance to dummy and then crash over.

The next big moment in the game was one of a few that involved Atkins. One of his trademark brilliant ball steals and sprint almost the full length of the field all came to nothing because he had been adjudged offside.

Of course he was offside, but this was one of the rare occasions when it was actually spotted and acted upon by the officials.

The 6-2 lead was kept in tact for the rest of the first half.

Immediately after the restart was the most significant period of the game. It was the only period when Wire’s intensity seemed to drop that bit below where it needed to be for a Grand Final.

Although Wigan didn’t score in that period, they gained yardage with each set, which led to a belief that they could get in front and a vision on how they could do it.

It was actually Warrington who came close to scoring first in the second half, once again Atkins involved and having impressively dragged five Wigan players over the line with him, he couldn’t quite manage to ground the ball properly.

In their next set, Wigan made a rare clean break, by Farrell, who kept his composure to set up Gildart for the the equalising try and the game had it’s biggest turning point.

Less than ten minutes later, Wigan were in front. One of a small amount of Wire’s handling errors gifted Wigan a full set of six ten metres away from the Wire line. Sarginson took advantage of a fragmented defensive line to put a delicate grubber kick through for Charnley to score.

We all know a rugby ball can bounce anywhere, that kick did deserve a try but it could have evaded Charnley, just a couple of minutes later Clark’s kick, could, just could have bounced up for Lineham to score, instead it bounce out into touch. Sometimes the bounce of a ball really can make a difference.

Having conceded the momentum, Wire were now behind on the score board and it was always going to be tough to get back into it, but they gave it a good go.

A dubious penalty didn’t help, not just the two points being added to the score but a minute or so being taken off the clock, potentially depriving Wire one more set of possession at the end of the game.

Wire certainly gave Wigan a scare or two in those closing minutes and made sure that just like at Wembley the outcome of the game was in doubt until the very last play.