Start is vital: Leuluai

[josie andrews]

Tommy Leuluai previews Friday night’s Betfred Super League fixture against Hull KR.

34-year-old half-back expects a similar encounter to the one at KCOM Craven Park four weeks ago.

Leuluai: “It was nice to be back at home last week. It’s very important now going into the back end of the year that we’re strong at the DW and perform well.”

Tommy Leuluai says if Wigan Warriors are to win their fifth game in a row in the Betfred Super League on Friday, they must start at full throttle against Hull KR.

Wigan started their winning run at Rovers four weeks ago with a 19-18 victory, thanks to a Sam Powell 76th-minute drop-goal and Leuluai believes it will be a similar sort of game if his side don’t start well.

He said: “One of the big things for us is the way we start the game in our first couple of sets. We have to make sure we’re up for the challenge and hopefully we don’t give them the sense that we’re just going through the motions.

“I’m expecting another tight one against Hull KR. They had a good win last week, and when you face them you know they can potentially put a fair amount of points on the board quite quickly. They’re one of those teams that if you give them a sniff they can play really well.”

In the last two weeks, Adrian Lam’s right-side attack has been receiving praise with Chris Hankinson and Liam Marshall scoring four tries and creating four assists between them.

One of those assists was for Leuluai’s try against Huddersfield Giants two weeks ago and the scrum-half is pleased with how he and his teammates are racking up the points to help their team four important wins.

We’re working hard on it. I’ve jumped back into the halves a lot more in the last seven weeks or so. We’ve got those combinations going and both Chris and Marshy have been playing really well.

“Marshy’s a talented player. I suppose I keep on his case a bit, as I know the potential he’s got. I always keep on him and push him to try and get better. He’s been killing it in the last few weeks so good on him.

“In the last few weeks, we’ve started to post more points and you can see the improvement in our attack out wide.”

Last Friday, Wigan returned to the DW Stadium after eight weeks away and beat Salford Red Devils to move into the top five of the Betfred Super League for the first time this season.

Leuluai said: “It was a good win. There are still some areas where we need to improve, but we’ll take it though as they are right next to us on the ladder.

“It was nice to be back at home last week. It’s very important now going into the back end of the year that we’re strong at the DW and perform well.

“The top four is in our hands but there are so many teams fighting for it, so it’s going to go down to the last couple of weeks.”


https://www.wiganwarriors.com/news/2019 ... cDqmXD2.99

[Wiganer Ted]

We improved last Friday but there was still an amount of good fortune involved. Lolohea's knock on over the line was the turning point IMO. Had he scored it would have been 16-12 and a different game altogether from then on. They also had a try disallowed in the final minutes for a forward pass.

The collision between Marshall and Hardaker going for the high ball was a shambles and not the first time that's happened. We have been caught out by the overhead high ball when our defence had been jamming in. At Hudds they did that in both halves and their first try was a belter and caught us out. They did that second half too. Hastings did that with the pass for Olpherts try after the collision shambles.

Those things are just the obvious ones that us speccies can see. Heaven knows what else is going on that we are not aware of.
We need to tighten up and work to keep the opposition down to one try a game. A big ask for the next two games but we've a better chance v HKR than Saints.