Far too early to make comparisons, although he does seem to be falling into the trap of sticking with what he perceives to be 'safety first' team selections & tactics. One similarity is both had fast, exciting wingers in the squad but seemed reluctant to play them for fear of possible defensive frailties
At first, Cunningham's teams didn't play the turgid, boring, ineffective rugby he later reverted to. It was only when results began to slip away that I think he panicked for his job and pulled up the drawbridge.
I don't want Wellens to fall into that trap, but he's inherited a much different - and far better - side. He's so far just seemed to copy the Woolfball playbook. The initial problem was that the players, after the WCC win (where they played the right balance of defensive steel, quick line speed, and attacking prowess) struggled initially in the SL games. We have talked about fatigue, and many have dismissed that as just an excuse.
I personally think the fatigue now is a mental fatigue.
Players have won it all. They've done it tough, too, playing a physically robust way, and having to cover a number of injuries. They were all up for the NRL games; these were new, there was a big prize immediately on the line. Coming back to the UK, knowing they have to climb the long season mountain again... it's tough to retain the same level of motivation as when you were hungry for trophies. I imagine also there could also be a sense of being able to win matches in 2nd/3rd gear for most of the game (as we did at times with Woolf). When participating in sport at the top level, small margins make big differences. Even a 5% drop-off in intensity can lead to problems.
Then we have the opening few games. We struggled for defensive solidity against Cas but still ended up winning comfortably. Many pundits marked this as a huge banana skin after the travelling; probably gave a false sense of superiority to the players. Who knew then how poor Cas would turn out to be? Even against Leeds we were the more dominant team, but couldn't shake them off (not helped by their play-acting and two sin-binnings). The loss, though, was ultimately down to a refereeing travesty, and I think that loss dented confidence amongst the players. Leigh, and we face a team scenting blood from us and wanting to put on a show at their home ground. Again, although to a lesser extent, a wrong ref decision turns the game against us. Players begin to seconbd guess themselves (and, I assume, the officials and their agendas)
I think any plans Wellens and the coaching team had for the team's evolution over the opening third/half of the season went out the window at that point. Was a case of getting points on the board and keeping in contention with the top 2/4. It was a case of sticking to what you - and the players - know.
It's far too early to be getting on Wellens' back. But I do hope he has plans to improve our attacking, which is too one-dimensional and easy to defend. We're averaging scoring less than 20 points per game and that includes a bit of a blow-out against Wakey (take that out, and it's less than 17 points). For comparison, Warrington average 31.5.
Under Woolf, we would physically dominate teams into submission. A combination of our players not being quite at the same intensity, officials pinging us for trivialities (that other teams don't seem to suffer with), and opposition teams both increasing their effort against us to try to take down the World Champs and playing around our once-formidable 'middle', means that we haven't been able to do that too many times this season.
We need a 'plan B', which must include better attacking tactics.