Wane: Beaten by a better team in every department

The 32-16 loss put his side four points off the pace in the race to the top four, with only six games to go before the Super League semi-finals.

Tom Davies scored a double before half-time to give Wigan hope at 10-10, but a poor second half undid the champions’ hopes, and Wane couldn’t hide his disappointment.

“Disappointing, poor, we lacked in energy,” was the coach’s assessment.

“I think when we kicked, their first two three players killed us and when we kicked our first two or three didn’t.”

Stevie Ward scored a hat-trick, with a double from Ashton Golding and a try from Matt Parcell making up Leeds’ total in a forgettable night for the Warriors.

And after last weekend’s Challenge Cup semi-final win over Salford, Wane admitted the performance was hard to take.

“We’ve won a final, we’re in another final but today we took a step back,” he said.

“They didn’t look flat today. They looked a lot more energised than we did.

“But we’ve absolutely no excuse.”

Wigan host Huddersfield next weekend in the second round of Super 8s, where they will look to get back on track in the league as the Challenge Cup final at Wembley nears.

And Wane is more convinced than he was before that Wigan will need to win all of their remaining games to stay in the hunt for a top four place.

“Without a doubt but I thought that before the game,” he said when asked if he thought Wigan now need six wins from their last six games.

“But we will never, ever give in.

“We’re in when we get back to Orrell now, in the morning, Sunday.”

“We were beaten by a better team in every department.”

“Some individual defensive errors were just not Wigan and unfortunately they all came out today.

“We have seven days to get them sorted and turn up against Huddersfield. That will be a massive challenge again next week.”