Injury curse strikes as Wolves crash again

WARRINGTON’S injury curse struck again as they suffered their third defeat in a row going down 32-12 at table topping Leeds.
With the influential Lee Briers again absent Warrington suffered a blow before kick-off when second rower Paul Johnson pulled a hamstring in the warm-up while full-back Stuart Reardon went off four minutes into the second half with a recurrence of his hamstring injury.
Coach Paul Cullen promoted Rob Parker into his starting line-up and went with 16 players. Lee Mitchell was drafted onto the bench but had played the full 80 minutes of the curtain-raiser between the two clubs’ reserve sides.
But Cullen, who is reluctant to blame injuries said: “That’s not an excuse. We had to deal with it.
“It was a better performance than the last two weeks. It was a really decent defensive effort but we fell away in the avalanche of penalties. The volume of possession in favour of Leeds broke our back.
“There was a spell in the third quarter when we didn’t touch the ball for 10 or 12 minutes.”
Warrington made the brighter start and took the lead with Louis Anderson’s eighth-minute try which was goaled by Hicks.
But the champions struck back on 28 minutes when leading try scorer Scott Donald demonstrated both power and pace to get past Hicks and speed away from the cover to register his try.
Skipper Kevin Sinfield levelled the scores with the conversion, extending his scoring sequence to 53 matches, and he edged his side in front with an injury-time penalty after Warrington were caught offside in front of their own posts.
Warrington fell further behind when Donald scored his second try six minutes into the second half but this time in fortunate circumstances.
Leeds’ attack looked to have stalled when Brent Webb’s mis-directed pass went behind centre Keith Senior but the Kiwi full-back made up for his error by regathering the loose ball and, with Chris Riley out of position, sent Donald in unopposed for his 12th try of the season.
Sinfield added his second conversion and on 55 minutes kicked a second penalty to extend his side’s lead to 16-6.
It went from bad to worse for the visitors when hooker Jon Clarke was sin-binned for dissent on 58 minutes and Leeds instantly made the extra man count, with Carl Ablett crossing at the corner for his side’s third try.
Sinfield maintained his 100% record with the touchline conversion to make the game safe at 22-6.
Hicks grabbed a consolation try, courtesy of a cut-out pass from Monaghan, and added the goal but Leeds finished well on top and wrapped up their ninth win of the season with late tries from Rob Burrow and Luke Burgess, Sinfield taking his goal tally to six.