Have your say: Wane set for return to Leeds with his Warriors

Ordinarily, it is unusual for the gregarious Wiganer to be anything but effusive about his adored hometown club.

Indeed today, as coach of the rugby league outfit for whom he was an uncompromising prop at the start of their halcyon days in the mid-1980s, he has a reputation for readily expressing his love for the side he now commands.

Wane essentially lives and breathes Wigan and, despite a crippling list of absentees, will still expect them to secure an 11th successive win when they head to Super League champions Leeds Rhinos this evening.

However, 20 years ago, he was in Leeds colours, back at his old stomping ground of Central Park, helpless as the prolific Offiah completed his remarkable feat.

Wigan inflicted a hugely embarrassing defeat in the 1992 Premiership semi-final, ruthlessly picking apart a side including Great Britain stars Garry Schofield, Bobbie Goulding and Paul Dixon plus classy All Black Craig Innes.

Wane recalled to the Yorkshire Post: “I was gutted that day. Going back there (to Wigan) in to the away dressing room...

“We actually went into that game thinking we’d win. We trained well and our form had been good but Wigan were just simply on fire.

“They were unstoppable and it was a depressing day for me.”

Wane, a gnarled front-row when Wigan famously defeated Manly in the 1987 World Club Challenge, represented Great Britain before switching to Headingley in 1990.

It was a move plenty of his illustrious team-mates repeated soon after but perennial big spenders Leeds failed to replicate Wigan’s success.

Wane explained: “Andy Gregory went too and I was there before Ellery Hanley and Andy Goodway.

“When you looked at that team on paper we probably should have won more often than we did

“There was some reasons though – a couple of players were coming to the end of their careers.

“I still have a lot of affection for the club, though. Leeds treated me and my wife really well.

“I really enjoyed three years there and met some very good people. I knew (president) Harry Jepson very well as he’d been in charge of the Great Britain Colts tour to Australia and I’d always stayed in touch with him.

“David Ward was my first coach – before Dougie Laughton – and I always rated him; he was Leeds through and through.”

Which is just what can be said of how Wane regards Wigan.

Having acted as Michael Maguire’s assistant for the previous two years, helping them to the 2010 Super League title and last year’s Challenge Cup, he succeeded the Australian in October.

The transition has been more than smooth, with Wane stamping his own mark on the side who currently sit at the top of the elite.

While Maguire’s side undoubtedly produced results, it was often very structured and machine-like with little room for individualism.

Wane, 47, has encouraged his version to be more open whenever the opportunity arises, resulting in a vibrant brand of football which, at times, has been as exhilarating as that class of ‘92 with Sam Tomkins, invariably, at its epicentre.

With all the steeliness you would expect of a side in Wane’s mould, it is no surprise Wigan are still much fancied to overcome Leeds despite missing five forwards.

He says: “If you have the quality to play, go play and make sure you score. I don’t agree with this assessing chances first and working out percentages.

“If you’re good enough, it becomes a good percentage for you to score at the end of it.

“I won’t buy into that other rubbish; if it doesn’t come off, I back my team in defence as well as attack. I don’t like missing opportunities and we have a team here that buys into that.

“We do a lot of core skill work and have done since pre-season. That’s paying off now.

“But the senior players in the team are pushing that. I push it in training, they push it in training and I like to execute plays.”

He jokes that he and assistant Iestyn Harris, a more readily recognisable Leeds alumnus, are limbering up to make their comebacks.

You know, though, he has every confidence in the likes of untried teenager Rhodri Lloyd and Logan Tomkins if required.

“I’m loving everything yet know it could all suddenly stop,” he says. “But I’ll keep pushing people hard and Leeds will be a real test.”