Catalans 8-24 Warrington: Player ratings and major talking points

Catalans suffered their first defeat of the season in a superb clash in France against Warrington Wolves. The Wire laid down a real marker with a stern defensive performance against the Dragons and could very well be headed in the right direction after a slow start to the season.

Major Talking Points:

1. Jake Mamo the centre of attention

In previous years, Mamo has impressed at fullback but so far this season he’s done well at centre. He and centre partner Toby King were outstanding today always shutting down Catalans’ probing attacks and coming up with game breaking scores. For me Mamo shouldn’t be dropped even with the debut of Greg Inglis next week.

2. Not panic stations for Catalans

For the Dragons it was just one of those days. They were the better team for the first 30 minutes and weren’t too far away for the next 50. Many of Warrington’s tries came from moments of luck or silly errors and on another day the Dragons might have won. They just need to keep their heads down and keep doing what they’ve been doing.

3. Brilliant Warrington defence

They say attack wins you games but defence wins you titles. Warrington’s attack hasn’t been good enough so far this season and it wasn’t particularly great today. However, their defence has seen them compete in every game. They’re well in the hunt at the top now thanks to brilliant performances in defence as we saw today. They must marry that with a potent attack and perhaps keeping Stefan Ratchford in the halves could be the way to do that.

Player Ratings:

Catalans

29 Sam Tomkins – 7
2 Tom Davies – 6
4 Dean Whare – 6
3 Samisoni Langi – 6
5 Fouad Yaha – 6
6 James Maloney – 8
7 Josh Drinkwater – 6
8 Gil Dudson – 6
14 Alrix Da Costa – 6
10 Julian Bousquet – 7
11 Matt Whitley – 7
12 Mike McMeeken – 7
13 Benjamin Garcia – 7

Substitutes

9 Michael McIlorum – 6
16 Paul Seguier – 7
24 Jason Baitieri – 7
28 Sam Kasiano – 8

Warrington

17 Matty Ashton – 7
23 Josh Thewlis – 6
18 Jake Mamo – 8
4 Toby King – 8
5 Josh Charnley – 6
1 Stefan Ratchford – 7
7 Gareth Widdop – 9
8 Chris Hill – 7
9 Daryl Clark – 8
10 Mike Cooper – 7
11 Ben Currie – 7
12 Jack Hughes – 8
15 Matt Davis – 7

Substitutes

13 Joe Philbin – 7
14 Jason Clark – 7
16 Danny Walker – 6
19 Rob Mulhern – 7