Wigan Warriors 10 Castleford Tigers 27: Powell's men toil at start but class surfaces in victory

Admittedly, they made hard work of winning this game, but the fact they are winning at Wigan says plenty about Daryl Powell’s side.

Back-to-back tries midway through the first half from Jake Webster and Luke Gale ultimately proved enough to beat the champions, who were stubborn and spirited, but essentially missing too many injured stars to truly worry a side who hope to usurp them come October.

This said, as Wigan closed to 20-10 with Morgan Escare’s second try in the 73rd minute, tiring Castleford were grateful to the competition’s leading scorer Greg Eden, who not only denied a certain score by intercepting Joel Tomkins’s pass, but then raced 90m to claim his 11th of the season and confirm victory.

Tigers won without captain Michael Shenton, the England centre who pulled up with a back spasm during the warm-up.

But their new-found defensive resilience was to the fore as they soaked up plenty of pressure to secure a first win at Wigan since their famous 2014 Challenge Cup success.

All of which means Castleford will host Wakefield Trinity on Good Friday – that could be the best such derby for some time – seeking an eighth win from their opening nine games.

Joel Monaghan, who scored a hat-trick in last week’s emphatic win over Huddersfield Giants but was initially left out of the 17 here, came in on the wing with Greg Minikin, returning from a shoulder injury, moving inside to centre to replace Shenton.

However, for the third successive game, Castleford were slow out of the blocks. Powell could only watch on in disbelief as his sluggish side spilled the ball in each of their opening three sets and, each time, with no one even near the erring player.

Webster, Nathan Massey and Mike McMeeken were the guilty parties.

Throw in a high tackle from Ben Roberts on Liam Farrell and needing to defend a drop-out set, too, and it was remarkable the visitors escaped unharmed.

Credit that defence, though, and some questionable Wigan kicking, Ryan Sutton coming closest to scoring for Shaun Wane’s side only to be held up over the goalline by the Tigers.

Nevertheless, it meant Castleford did not venture into the home side’s half with the ball intact until the 11th minute.

After absorbing so much pressure – Sam Powell was also later forcibly denied having breached the goalline – and expending such high levels of energy, many teams would then struggle to find any sort of momentum in attack.

However, Powell’s side have a wonderful ability to spring into life almost at will.

Granted, there was no breakthrough until as late as the 24th minute, but then came that double blast in as many minutes. Firstly, Castleford were rewarded for turning down an easy penalty goal with a brilliantly executed try on the last tackle, stand-off Roberts fooling Wigan’s defence with his delayed pass that found Webster charging over from close in.

In the next set, prop Jesse Sene-Lefao squeezed out a late offload on halfway and Zak Hardaker – in his 200th career game – spotted space down the middle, accelerating past the helpless front-row Taulima Tautai before drawing Escare to send Gale scampering between the posts. The scrum-half, who has scored nine tries in just eight games so far, converted both and added a penalty soon after for a 14-0 lead.

Wigan finally found some attacking cohesion as Escare got on the outside of Gale to arc over out wide. He could not convert, but it kept his side in touch at the break.

So imagine Wane’s dismay when they conceded the softest of tries barely two minutes into the second period.

Prop Sene-Lefao takes some stopping at the best of times. So, when Escare and Tautai foolishly tried grabbing his arm sleeves 20m out, it was only going to end with one conclusion, the forward striding clear to score and Gale extending his side’s lead to 20-4.

That was always likely to be enough for Powell’s side despite Wigan’s typical push. Gale scored a drop-goal in the final seconds to rub it in.

Wigan Warriors: Escare; Davies, Forsyth, Isa, Marshall; Williams, Leuluai; Nuuausala, Powell, Flower, J Tomkins, Farrell, Sutton. Substitutes: Clubb, Tautai, Gregson, Bretherton.

Castleford Tigers: Hardaker; Monaghan, Webster, Minikin, Eden; Roberts, Gale; Massey, McShane, Cook, Holmes, McMeeken, Milner. Substitutes: Sene-Lefao, Moors, Springer, Chase.

Referee: Robert Hicks (Oldham).