Warrington Wolves 42 Hull KR 10: Robins fightback falls short as Wolves triumph

The Wolves had built an 18-0 lead at half-time but tries from Rhys Lovegrove and Craig Hall for the visitors had cut that lead to just eight points midway through the second half.

But winger Chris Riley grabbed his second try of the game on 63 minutes to ease any Warrington concerns.

And the home side made the game safe when Ben Westwood crashed over for two tries in two minutes and Ryan Atkin also crossed as the Wolves ran in three tries in the final six minutes.

Brett Hodgson collected a 14-point haul on his first appearance of the season with seven goals from seven attempts.

Hull KR coach Craig Sandercock was disappointed how his side let the scoreboard get away from them late in the game.

Sandercock said: “I’m very disappointed with the last three tries that’s for sure and obviously (Brett) Hodgson was on with his goalkicking, and that exacerbates the situation.

“We fought back well to 18-10 and I thought we might just sneak home here but at the end there was some very inept defence by us which exacerbated the scoreline.

“It’s fair to say we panicked when we had some ball attacking their line and some players who probably should no better threw some passes that weren’t on and offloading a fair bit and tending to try and push the pass and lacked the composure needed.

“Warrington have a myriad of international players and we haven’t and you need to be at your best and a couple of individuals were slightly down and every single 50-50 call went against us and we had no luck.”

Wolves coach Tony Smith said: “In the first half our defence was unbelievable. To give them so much ball on our try line it was remarkable not to cave in. I think we had around 36 tackles in a row on our own line just before half-time and that shows a fair bit of commitment from the team to defend that many back-to-back sets.

“But we were able to finish off with a few more spectacular tries which we are capable of.”

Warrington: Hodgson, Riley, C. Bridge, Atkin, J. Monaghan, Briers, Myler, Morley, M. Monaghan, Wood, Waterhouse, Westwood, Cooper. Substitutes: Ratchford, Carvell, Hill, Blythe.

Hull K R: McDonnell, Hall, Welham, Webster, Latus, Lovegrove, Dobson, Clinton, J. Hodgson, Paea, Mika, Horne, Watts. Substitutes: Carlile, Taylor, Wheeldon, Netherton.

Referee: R Silverwood (Dewsbury).