‘It was only a friendly, but I didn’t see a lot from Warrington’ – Shaun Wane unimpressed by Warrington as he believes Daryl Powell has a ‘difficult’ job

The rivalry between Shaun Wane and Daryl Powell goes back a few years after the duo churned out some terrific games in Super League and the Challenge Cup when they were coaching Wigan Warriors and Castleford Tigers respectively.

Both tough managers with an incredible desire to win, both have since moved on from those roles with Wane now back at the DW Stadium in a leadership role and Powell with the Warrington Wolves.

For Powell, however, his first game as Wire boss could not have gone much worse, going down 14-6 in Stefan Ratchford’s testimonial.

And, according to Wane, that didn’t show Powell or his players in the best light.

“It’s a totally different group of players, different mentality and a big cub with no disrespect to Cas,” Wane told BBC 5 Live.

“With lots of really good facilities, but you’ve got lots of different personalities and it’s going to be a difficult job.”

That being said, Wane wasn’t too impressed with Warrington’s showing against Wigan that ended in defeat for the Wolves.

“I’ll be totally honest, it was only a friendly, but I didn’t see a lot from Warrington and I know a lot of players in the Warrington team and they can perform a lot better than what they did and I’m sure they will do when the season kicks off.

“I know Daryl and Karl (Warrington CEO, Karl Fitzpatrick) will be bitterly disappointed against Wigan in the friendly.

“I expected a lot more from them having a really good pre-season – they didn’t deliver that game but I’m looking forward to seeing how they deliver in the first few weeks.”