Lam believes Wigan could have “won by more”

Wigan Warriors bounced back to winning ways with a narrow 16-12 home win over the Huddersfield Giants but Head Coach Adrian Lam believed they could have “won by more”.

He lamented what he thought were many missed opportunities to score during the first half before they ended up trailing 12-6 at half-time.

Though they got the result in the end, Lam is hopeful of improvement as the season goes on.

He said, “I thought we created five genuine chances in the first half where I guess at the end of last season we would have scored and all of a sudden it is a 20-point half-time lead instead of losing 12-6.

“I think that a few opportunities were down our left edge with Oliver Gildart and Liam Marshall but they have not played until four weeks ago after being absent for many months.

“To get that fluency, they need time playing and this is part of the puzzle where we are doing it really tough at the moment.

“Even though we do have some players back, still only short game time. Tom Leuluai missed six weeks, Tony Clubb missed two months and it goes on and on.”

In particular, Lam highlighted key areas of improvement he hopes to see from his side.

He added, “There were certain moments in the game where I was frustrated and that reflects where we are at as a team.

“I just thought we could have ‘iced’ the game in different areas all the way through.

“The kick at the end that went dead for a 20-metre restart gave them a seven tackle set to come back into our half that I was pretty upset and disappointed about.

“I think that when you are down on confidence and you have not won for a few weeks, the lack of confidence creeps in to your mentality.

“It is a stepping stone. We have to walk before we can run again. It was a tough win but one we desperately needed and hopefully we can build some blocks moving forward.”