Castleford Tigers v Wigan Warriors: Key game in Cas quest for top four

The West Yorkshire club could usurp Wigan from fourth spot if they secure a fifth successive win at Wheldon Road this evening.

Their opponents are in all sorts of trouble, not only arriving on a three-match losing streak but having not even scored a try for more than 200 minutes of action.

Powell conceded: “They are under a bit of pressure.

“You can see that and on Sky there’s all sorts of things being put up there about the zero scorelines.

“But that makes them dangerous. How they respond to that pressure is down to them. All we can do is look after ourselves.

“How are we going to play and what are we going to deliver? That’s the key thing for us.

“If we can maintain consistency in terms of all the effort things – which we have been really good at – and probably have a bit more accuracy and clarity in good attacking positions then we are dangerous ourselves.”

Indeed, in-form Castleford have returned to the top six for the first time in months after Thursday’s win at Hull FC.

They have also won their last five home meetings with Wigan and, if that becomes six, Powell believes their play-off hopes are very much alive.

He said: “It’s in our hands. I’ve seen the games every team has to play, particularly from fourth down, and I do think we have a really good opportunity to get a bit higher up the table than we may have thought we could.

“This is a key game. We potentially go above Wigan if we win; Leeds have a tough game against Wakefield. It’s going to be down to us and holding our nerve and if we do that we could be in a real solid position.”

Loose forward Adam Milner will start at hooker, where he played most of the game at Hull after replacing Paul McShane who suffered an abdominal injury which Powell hopes is “not as bad as first thought”.

Captain Michael Shenton returns from a fractured cheekbone and the likes of Australian forwards Grant Millington and Jesse Sene-Lefao, as well as Tyla Hepi, could also come in.