Warriors Show Mettle in Brave Fightback

Wigan's rugby league team may have lost the clout to play big matches on their home ground, but they do at least remain on the road to Old Trafford.

Trent Barrett, their high-pedigree Australian stand-off who is on the way home himself at the end of the season, steered them through a stormy and slightly surreal evening in Widnes in which Bradford believed their captain, Paul Deacon, was cynically taken out, and the Wigan supporters chanted for Sunderland - whose Premier League match at the JJB Stadium today prompted the switch to a neutral venue for the first game of the Super League play-offs.

Barrett's precise kicks laid on Wigan's two crucial tries in the second half to complete a comeback from an early 8-0 deficit, although the Bulls were convinced that the turning point of the game came midway through the first half when Deacon was felled by a late tackle from his former team-mate Stuart Fielden. The scrum-half did not reappear after the break and Bradford were never the same force.

Wigan now qualify for another elimination game next weekend, and if Warrington pull off a shock win against the Catalans in Perpignan tonight, they could even be at home. However, they still looked understandably disorientated in the opening exchanges while Bradford's pack revived memories of their golden era with a dominant performance.

It was a funny sort of night, with the coaches carrying both teams to Widnes for what should have been a home Wigan fixture arriving at the same time, and a hastily written sign in the players' tunnel reading "This is Wigan" in an attempt to make the Warriors players feel at home.

The veteran Samoan prop Joe Vagana set the tone with a brutal, but fair, tackle on Fielden, and within five minutes the visitors took the lead through a Deacon penalty. They were convinced they should have gone further ahead when Chris Nero claimed a try from Deacon's high kick, but within minutes they were over anyway with a far simpler score from the prop Andy Lynch, whose powerful hand-off sent Harrison Hansen sprawling, Deacon's simple conversion establishing the 8-0 lead.

But the balance of power shifted towards Wigan late in the first half, with two tries in 10 minutes putting them 12-8 ahead. The lively scrum-half Thomas Leuluai burrowed under some sloppy Bradford defence for the first and Hansen flopped over unmarked for the second after Glenn Morrison had been caught out of position in his first appearance since May.

They extended that lead when Mark Calderwood touched down Trent Barrett's brilliantly conceived and executed kick. Bradford responded through another surprisingly soft try, this time from Simon Finnigan, but in the 64th minute Barrett regained Wigan some breathing space with another clever kick for Calderwood, who sent Joel Tomkins over. Gareth Hock removed any remaining doubt about the outcome with a powerful individual try and Richards kicked to make it 30-14.

Wigan Warriors Mathers; Calderwood, Phelps, Carmont, Richards; Barrett, Leuluai; Fielden, Higham, Coley, Hansen, Bailey, J Tomkins.Interchange Paleaaesina, Hock, O'Carroll, Smith.

Bradford Bulls Platt; Evans, Sykes, Nero, Tadulala; Jeffries, Deacon; Vagana, Newton, Lynch, Solomona, Finnigan, Langley. Interchange Harris, Morrison, Cook, Kopczak.

Referee A Klein (Silsden).