Warriors chairman Ian Lenagan reveals health scare as he reflects on 16-year ownership ahead of historic final

Speaking to ITV’s Chris Hall, the 77-year-old shared that he suffered a stroke during the pandemic, but decided not to speak out at the time.

“Life was difficult enough during Covid, my own particular problems were nowhere near what some families had suffered,” he told ITV.

“So it would have been quite incongruous to talk about it or seek sympathy. It was quite a bad stroke, I still lose words and forget things, but considering what it could have been, it was a great warning and you have to be careful then and I’m delighted to be over it.”

Lenagan is set for a fairytale ending to his 16-year family ownership of Wigan, having bought the club from Dave Whelan at the end of 2007 in a state that he admits was ‘pretty poor’ at the time.

Under his reign, which will officially come to a close at the end of November with Mike Danson set to become the club’s 100% owner, Wigan have claimed three Challenge Cups, four League Leaders’ Shields and a World Club Challenge in 2017, and will aim for their fifth Super League title this Saturday against Catalans.

Asked how the club was when he first took over, Lenagan responded: “It was pretty poor, I was somewhat surprised.

“Having had the magnificent period in the 80s and 90s, it was very difficult for Wigan to get back to that era. I remember Pat Richards saying to me that he’d actually been in five semi-finals and lost every one of them so it was time for a win, then you’ve got to build the community and do all the things that are right.

“Statistics when you’re at the end of an era you begin to look at and the fact that we’ve won 12 trophies in 16 years and been in 16 finals with one more yet to come, it’s rather a nice number.”

However, although another final triumph would cement a dream ending to his leadership of the Super League outfit, Lenagan admitted on Saturday’s outcome: “We’ve won lots of trophies over a period of time, I can’t demand having another one.”