Adrian Lam pointed to his own side’s errors as the Leigh Leopards boss was left to rue individual mistakes in the derby defeat against Wigan Warriors.
Leigh were almost perfect in the first half but a lapse of concentration saw Jai Field score the first of Wigan’s four tries as the Warriors won 20-8, to hand a huge blow to the Leopards’ top four hopes.
Adrian Lam’s side had been beaten just twice in the last 13 games, with both those losses coming at the hands of Hull KR, though they ultimately beat themselves at the Leigh Sports Village.
Ultimately, Wigan had to punish the mistakes but three of the four tries were just gift-wrapped as a result of the Leopards either switching off, knocking on, or simply missing assignments.
Asked post-match if it was a case of a game of two halves, Adrian Lam agreed, telling Sky Sports: “Pretty much. We just hurt ourselves (with) just basic skills, really.
“It was hard to watch in the second half there. I thought we were awesome first half, but I’m going to make it a positive really. I thought the first 40 minutes was unbelievably good and very, very close to being very, very good.
“I don’t want to dwell too much on the second half. I think a couple of individual errors there put us under pressure, and then a switch in mindset. I think a little bit of negativity creeped in there, and then our game plan just fell out the door and we lost our way. There’s plenty to learn out of that, and we’ll be better for it.”
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Leigh Leopards boss to take positives despite devastating defeat
Those individual errors including Jack Hughes’ misplaced pass for Bevan French’s score, Lazarus Vaalepu’s intercepted offload for Zach Eckersley’s try, amid a number of others that invited pressure on themselves.
On those mistakes, Lam said: “I think there was a lot in the second half there that wasn’t how we played, it was just individual poor skill put us under pressure.
“The one on the 38th minute of the first half, I went in the dressing room there tried to lift them up from that and from then on it was sort of like a bit of implosion. We’ll learn a lot from tonight.”
Lam also admitted that it’s tough to actually train for such an error-strewn collapse, noting: “It’s difficult, and you can’t change it till after the game in review, to be honest with you.
“It’s hard to train for what happened in that second half there. You can learn from what we did. It was the complete opposite of what you’ve got to do, and that’s okay. I’m good at that. I’m good at making them understand what happened there and we’ll be better for it.”
As for the lessons for next week when they take on York Knights, Lam admitted: “I just think it’s pretty simple. I think I can go in there and they can tell me exactly how we fix it.
“It’s not so much that. It’s the poor skill that puts us in that position and then the switch of mindset into a little bit of negativity and then everyone sort of falls away from the struts and styles of who we want to be in the process.
“Like I said, I want to make this a positive and I think we’re very, very close to being very good and I’m happy about that.”
With just six games to go, Leigh now sit in sixth place, six points shy of second and only two points clear of seventh. On the run-in, Lam said: “We’ve got six games left. I think there’s four at home and two away. We’ve got York here next week so we’ll just get back to our best here.
“(There will) maybe be a few positional changes. I think we had six positional changes tonight. That doesn’t help. That’s why the first 38 minutes was so class for us.
“Like I said, I want to make it positive. I’m really happy of how we’ve done tonight. Not happy with the outcome, but the things we can fix are pretty easy.”
Wigan Warriors defeat Leigh Leopards after overturning a half-time deficit! 💪 pic.twitter.com/Ao8RtZolpd
— Sky Sports Rugby League (@SkySportsRL) July 31, 2026
