Warrington Wolves host Wigan Warriors in Super League on Friday night with both clubs coming off defeats, and we’ve taken a look at the early team news.
Wire lost just their second match of the Super League season as they were blitzed by Catalans Dragons in the second-half on their away trip to Perpignan, with Lewis Dodd scoring a hat-trick as Sam Burgess’ side fell to a 38-22 defeat.
Sunday saw Wigan lose 24-14 against bottom of the table Castleford Tigers with the Warriors losing their third Super League game in a row after an unbeaten first five matches to start the season.
Wigan can certainly point to several key players missing as one of the reasons why they lost and so we’ve taken an early look at each club’s team news in respect to which players are ruled out and which players are doubts for Friday night’s game.
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Warrington Wolves outs and doubts
Warrington were without full-back Cai Taylor-Wray last week but he could be back for Friday night after being sat down due to a hand issue that he sustained in the Challenge Cup win over Leigh.
Forwards Toafofoa Sipley and James Harrison picked up knocks in the loss to Catalans. Sipley, who had just returned from a knee injury, was feared to have injured that same knee whilst Harrison picked up an ankle issue.
In terms of players who have been ruled out, Josh Smith is still expected to be a few weeks after a training ground injury whilst Jordy Crowther could be another couple of weeks after undergoing surgery for a broken cheekbone.
Arron Lindop is still recovering from last year’s ACL injury whilst Luke Yates is nursing a neck/shoulder injury.
Wigan Warriors outs and doubts
Wigan have a long list of players ruled out, starting with the suspended pair of Harry Smith and Sam Walters who still have two more games to serve.
Oliver Wilson (ACL) and Abbas Miski (hamstring/knee) haven’t featured all season whilst Jake Wardle (knee) has been down since round one. Bevan French is still some time away with his hamstring injury as well.
Ethan Havard was named to the 21-man squad to face Castleford but pulled up with a calf issue in training, something that will be scanned and assessed ahead of Friday.
