| Leigh (20) 30 |
| Tries: O’Brien 2, Briscoe, Charnley, Reynolds Goals: Reynolds 5 |
| Warrington (12) 12 |
| Tries: Williams, Philbin Goals: Ratchford 2 |
Leigh Leopards moved within four points of the Super League summit with a fine win over leaders Warrington Wolves – their eighth victory of the season.
Former Wires Gareth O’Brien, who scored two tries, and Josh Charnley crossed, along with Tom Briscoe and Ben Reynolds for Adrian Lam’s side.
Daryl Powell’s Wire had only lost to Wigan and champions St Helens this season before this away defeat.
Their points came from George Williams and Joe Philbin’s first-half scores.
After dominating the Championship with a star-studded side, Lam’s Leigh have made equally impressive waves in the Super League following promotion and any thoughts of battling the drop have been replaced by dreams of play-off glory.
In boss Adrian’s son Lachlan they have one of the choice playmakers in the division and his prompting alongside the steady boot of Reynolds and the subtlety of loose-forward John Asiata has been key to their form.
Lam teed up O’Brien’s opening score, with a burst off the scrum, while Reynolds delivered Briscoe’s score, and a combination of the pivots created Charnley’s try.
Star hooker Edwin Ipape parted the defence for O’Brien’s second, while Reynolds profited from an error to streak downfield for his try and added a fifth goal to his tally.
Warrington never quite got a grip of their hosts but the class of Williams could not be contained when he finished off a Daryl Clark break, while Philbin was also the recipient of a sharp pass from the same player for his score.
Desperate defending denied them further scores, as Matt Dufty and Matty Ashton went close.
Leigh coach Adrian Lam:
“I am very proud. It was a tough game – Warrington are a quality side that has set the standards this season. We knew it was going to be physical and we just had to be up for the challenge.
“I thought we were reasonably good for most of the game but it wasn’t perfect. The way we defended our line showed how we just kept turning up for each other. I thought our defence was really solid.
“I don’t think one player stood out for us – that has been one of the secrets for us all season. It’s great to get six wins in a row but things can change quickly if you get too far ahead of ourselves.
“It’s a great feeling to beat the team that’s top of the table.”
Warrington coach Daryl Powell:
“It was a static start from us. Although we got a couple of tries we were lucky to go in with that scoreline of 20-12 at half-time.
“I thought we were dominated from start to finish – it was a really disappointing effort from us. Credit to Leigh, they were really good and played at the top of their game but we made too many errors and gave too many penalties away.
“That defeat has probably been coming for a few weeks. We have been winning games but have not been great, so we need to rediscover the way we played at the start of the season and get back to those levels.
“We had a lot of fans with us tonight and we didn’t give our fans enough to get behind us.”
Leigh: O’Brien; Briscoe, Leutele, Hardaker, Charnley; Reynolds, Lam; Amone, Ipape, Mulhern, Holmes, O’Donnell, Asiata
Interchanges: Mellor, Seumanufagai, Halton, Davis [Wilde]
Warrington: Dufty; Russell, Mata’utia, Ratchford, Ashton; Williams, Dean; Harrison, Walker, Vaughan, Currie, McGuire, Clark
Interchanges: Kasiano, Philbin, Dudson, Minikin [Bullock]