THE TRUEMAN SHOW

Tiger cub Jake’s hat-trick on debut

TEENAGE destroyer Jake Trueman marked his full Super League debut with a 17-minute hat-trick to leave Wigan’s title defence hanging by a thread.

Rookie half-back Trueman, 18, was unstoppable in the first half, crossing three times and setting up winger Greg Eden for another Tigers try.

He had made only one previous appearance as a substitute but got the call after Luke Gale had emergency appendix surgery last Tuesday.

Tigers boss Daryl Powell hailed the kid, saying: “You would be confident playing him whatever the game, and he handled that game with real assurance.

“You can see it is written all over him that he has this level mapped out. He is a very good player and he has a lot of smart things about him.

Tough

“Overall, we had 20 minutes of madness but it’s pretty tough to keep a team like Wigan quiet for 80 minutes. This was a huge win for us.”

Wigan will know their fate before they end their Super 8s campaign at Wakefield on Saturday.

The champions must hope Salford upset St Helens on Thursday or that Castleford have enough incentive to beat Challenge Cup winners Hull FC, 24 hours later.

Wigan coach Shaun Wane was furious, and said: “We now need favours off other teams and I am really pi***d off with it – too many of my players had a day off.” The Tigers led 26-0 after 44 minutes with Eden scoring his 38th Super League try of the year, Trueman grabbing his treble and Greg Minikin getting the first of his try double.

Wigan rallied in the third quarter with tries from Tom Davies, Sam Tomkins and Tommy Leuluai plus two goals from George Williams.

But Cas skipper Michael Shenton’s 72nd-minute try killed off the comeback.