Castleford Tigers boss Craig Lingard makes Harry Smith claim as he expresses Liam Watts frustration

On-field referee Tom Grant ultimately issued a yellow card for the challenge on Castleford full-back Luke Hooley, with the home side's frustrations compounded by Liam Watts' sending-off later in the first half.

The Tigers prop was given his marching orders on the half-hour mark for a shoulder charge to the head of opposite number Tyler Dupree.

Castleford were leading 4-2 at the time before conceding 30 unanswered points.

"What's the difference between that one and the Luke Hooley one?" said Lingard referring to an earlier high tackle.

"What's the difference between the contact on the Wigan player and Harry Smith picking somebody up and dropping him on his head?

"I don't want Harry Smith to get sent off but it has a massive impact on the game. I'm led to believe from the sideline that the recommendation from the video referee was that Harry Smith's was a red card and that on the recommendation of an on-field official it got reduced to a yellow card. Why?"

Watts' red card was greeted by disbelief with the front-rower left shaking his head and Lingard showing his frustration in the coaches' box.

Lingard felt the experienced forward was put in an impossible situation.

"I know there's a big thing about head contacts in rugby league and we're trying to make the sport safer, which we need to do," said Lingard.

"But we've had head coaches' meetings about what constitutes a red card and mitigating circumstances.

"We've been trying to teach players new habits. I just don't know what we expect Liam Watts to do there. In my opinion, the ball carrier has come into contact and whether he's deliberately lowered his height or slipped, his height has lowered. It's not a swinging arm.

"If someone flies out of the line and whacks somebody around the head deliberately or carelessly, you can wear that but I just can't wear this one.

"As a coach, how can I coach my players for that to not happen again? I can't coach anybody to do that.

"The mitigating circumstances there for me were the player was going down towards the ground."

Castleford took the fight to Wigan before the red card in their first game of the Lingard era.

The former Batley Bulldogs boss was encouraged by the performance.

"I thought we showed a lot of grit and determination and battled through a lot of adversity down to 12 men,” said Lingard.

"We knew it was going to be a tough game first up against the champions of last season but saw a lot of positives out there.

"We spoke this week about showing that togetherness and desire to play for each other and the club. I thought we saw that in abundance.