Sky Sports pundit Sam Tomkins believes Wigan Warriors’ Jai Field is getting better year on year in Super League.
The Australian full-back produced a man of the match worthy performance on Friday evening to help propel Wigan into a third straight Grand Final. Field set up Bevan French for what proved to be a decisive try at the end of the first half, but his biggest moment of the game came in the 63rd minute as the full-back got across to halt an Owen Trout breakaway.
With the Leopards trailing in the game, Trout looked set to touch down in the corner as he burst through a gap in the Wigan line, but Field stopped him in his tracks to kill the attack. It was a tackle that kept the Leopards at arm’s reach and ensured that he was the man being hailed after the game.
Head coach Matt Peet singled him out without any prompting when speaking to Sky Sports after the game and Field was the man spoken about in the post-match analysis, too, with Tomkins piling praise on the 28-year-old.
Tomkins, a former full-back himself of course, sees the improvements Field has made in his game and he firmly expects him to continue making strides forward during his time at the Brick Community Stadium, which won’t exactly be music to the ears of Wigan’s Super League rivals.
Sam Tomkins hails Wigan Warriors’ Jai Field
“He’s so solid in his communication with his spine and we spoke about it during the game, me and Jon [Wilkin], his organisation at full-back,” Tomkins said after the game. “I watch the game through a full-back’s eyes very often and I’m looking at the numbers on each side of the field.
“He very very rarely gets it wrong but the biggest compliment I can pay him is that he wasn’t great at that when he first came over and it’s the fact we’ve got a superstar in Jai Field who is improving year on year.
“He’s got consistency, he’s got such great knowledge of attack coming against him and he organises numbers so well. I don’t think he’s going to stop getting better for a long, long time.”
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