Warrington's Paul Cullen frustrated after losing unbeaten home record

Mar 31 2008 by Our Correspondent, Liverpool Daily Post

WARRINGTON coach Paul Cullen was a frustrated man after watching his side lose their unbeaten home record.

The second-placed Wolves lost ground on Super League champions Leeds after going down 8-6 to a gutsy Harlequins side in a mudbath at the Halliwell Jones Stadium.

Prop Gareth Haggerty scored his first try for Harlequins to help them into an 8-0 interval lead, and Paul Johnson’s try for the Wolves came too late to salvage the points.

“We were simply very poor,” said Cullen. “Our handling was poor and our completion was absolutely awful – and we paid the price for it.

“Unfortunately that was all we had left in us over the Easter period, but we’re not going to blame fatigue. That was a poor performance.

“Some of the mistakes we made were quite unbelievable. We lost our shape and we lost our structure – and from that we forced plays that were not working for us. We’re very frustrated.”

Already without five regulars through injury and suspension, Warrington lost centre Martin Gleeson with a pulled calf muscle three minutes into the second half.

Harlequins were without six first-choice players, and coach Brian McDermott paid tribute to his youngsters – including 21-year-old debutant Will Sharp.

“It was a tremendous effort,” he said.

“We had a few of our leaders out, and our young boys did a really good job for us. The likes of Michael Worrincy, Will Sharp and Tony Clubb dug deep.

“It was always going to be a tight game. I just thought we rolled our sleeves up and were prepared to get mucky.”

The Londoners were also indebted to veteran Henry Paul, who combined superbly with Frenchman Julien Rinaldi to form an effective half-back partnership.

“When Henry plays at loose forward he doesn’t get the chance to put on show the skills that he has still got. But he was in the halves tonight and he played the law of averages where he gets the ball in his hands that much that something good is going to happen,” said McDermott.”

Quins went close when centre David Howell chased Rinaldi’s kick to the corner and narrowly failed to get the touch but the Londoners eventually took the lead midway through the first half when Warrington’s Great Britain hooker Jon Clarke was pulled up for interference and Paul kicked the resultant penalty.

But the Wolves only had themselves to blame for being behind at the interval after failing to capitalise on the sin-binning of Harlequins centre David Howell on 23 minutes for a late challenge on Monaghan.

The under-manned Quins defence was stretched out of position only for Martin Gleeson to ignore his unmarked winger while Vinnie Anderson was unable to ground the ball when he managed to reach the line.

Warrington also ought to have made more of a rare break by Andy Bracek but their handling left a lot to be desired in the difficult conditions and their ineptitude allowed their opponents to dominate the second quarter.

It was no surprise when Harlequins extended their lead just before the break, Haggerty intercepting Monaghan’s pass on halfway and sprinting unopposed to the line.

Paul kicked his second goal to make it 8-0 and that was the last of the scoring until 13 minutes from the end when centre Paul Johnson took a pass from full-back Chris Hicks and stepped inside his man to touch down.

Hicks added the conversion too cut the deficit to two points.