Castleford coach Daryl Powell was unhappy with an apparent ‘crusher’ tackle by Wigan forward Morgan Smithies that ended James Clare’s afternoon.
The Tigers winger was stretchered off after a lengthy stoppage at the beginning of the second half, with Smithies shown a yellow card by referee James Child.
Although Derrell Olpherts crossed for the Tigers during their period of advantage, they were eventually relatively comfortably beaten 30-22 by the league leaders.
Powell said: “It was a terrible tackle. There were a couple of crushers in there that was disappointing, and that one in particular was a really bad tackle, so I hope he’s alright.
“I thought we were disappointing today. At 12-0 and the big turning point a couple of errors one with ball and one defensively that really hurt us, I just thought we were poor.
“Second half it took us until the game had gone a little bit before we got the energy we wanted.
Wigan 30-22 Castleford: Warriors come from behind to maintain top spot
A couple of tough bits, Truey got injured again so that was hard. Wigan deserved to beat us today, we would want to improve a fair bit on that, which was really disappointing as I thought we were ready to go today.
“There’s no excuses from that perspective, we’ve just got to improve.
“That’s a step back. Even though we didn’t score points against St Helens, I thought we were much better in that game than we were today.”
MORE REACTION: Adrian Lam hails youngster Ethan Havard after man of the match display
Sky Sports reporter Jenna Brooks provided an update on Clare’s injury during the Leeds and Salford game.
Latest – @CTRLFC winger James Clare in hospital. I’m hearing x-rays have come back clear and it looks to be a muscular issue in the neck.
— Jenna Brooks (@JennaBrooks) August 29, 2020
Castleford have lost all three of their games since the Super League restart, and face Salford on Thursday for an early kick-off at Headingley.
Adrian Lam “never saw it”!
What a pillock!!
Bet he didn’t see the head butting incident earlier on.