"I can tell you with conviction that George Williams will be in the NRL in 2020," says Carney
Wednesday 6 March 2019 18:47, UK
Brian Carney says George Williams will definitely be in the NRL in 2020, and that his unconfirmed future is proving a distraction for Wigan.
The Warriors are currently 10th in the Betfred Super League standings after winning just one of their first four outings in the league this season. The worst of the three losses occurred on Sunday, the defending champions beaten 18-16 by newcomers London Broncos.
Carney said there is a distraction which is contributing to Wigan's poor start to 2019, with star player George Williams continually linked with a move to the NRL at the end of this season.
"We know London beat Wakefield in Round 1 and the narrative will be 'don't take London lightly because they can do damage'... but Wigan were way off where they need to be," Carney told Sky Sports News.
"Adrian Lam post-match was critical of his senior players. He mentioned a couple of players who did well and performed well in that game but on the whole he was very disappointed.
"George Williams has come in for a bit of focus. Of course he's rumoured to be going to the NRL - I can tell you with conviction that George Williams will be in the NRL in 2020.
"That's a distraction at the moment, and something Adrian Lam has referenced in the media. His star playmaker, and one of the men that's pivotal to the new way that apparently Adrian Lam wants to have this Wigan side playing, is distracted with moves abroad and his future. They need to solve that, and solve it quickly."
However, Carney is refusing to write off the Warriors so early in the season.
"Remember, they are the champions," Carney said. "They have been in dark periods before under the previous coach Shaun Wane where the fans were calling for his head - Wane got them to Old Trafford and got them to a Grand Final win.
"It's too early to make a decisive decision on Wigan yet, other than to say Adrian Lam will want to hope this new plan he is putting in place clicks pretty soon."
On Friday night Wigan host Huddersfield live on Sky Sports, and the Warriors will be hoping to get their campaign on track against a side with even more problems. The Giants are currently at the bottom of the table; the only team yet to register a win in the competition.
When asked what has gone wrong for Huddersfield in the wake of their 28-8 loss to Hull FC last time out, Carney responded: "The answer to that lies in the comments of their coach post-match; 'We have got no resilience, zero resilience'. He was very scathing about his team's performance.
"When I went back and looked at the match statistics, Hull make 12 errors, Huddersfield make 12 errors.
"It's what you do when you make an error that lets you know how resilient a side is. At the moment, Huddersfield, while making errors, aren't able to defend those. When they lose the ball - it's their own fault, they drop the ball - they almost concede a try, it's almost like the flag has gone up. That has got to change.
"So Simon Woolford's identified 'We have no resilience as a team'. But here's the newsflash: it's the job of Simon Woolford to ensure that that team has resilience. So the answers for why there's no resilience must lie within the coach and what he's doing with that team."
