Wakefield Trinity made hard work of their win over Toulouse Olympique with Daryl Powell giving his verdict on what he felt was a courageous win.

Trinity eventually won 22-18 after a huge 106 minutes with plenty of those delays dictated through video referee reviews, including what the Wakefield boss felt was a ‘questionable’ sin bin for Josh Rourke.

Having lost to Toulouse in round one, Wakefield were keen to put that right but they slipped to an 8-0 deficit early on and despite running out to a 22-8 lead, the sin bin for Rourke turned the game with Toulouse coming close to securing the fightback win.

Speaking post-match, head coach Daryl Powell admitted: “We made it a little bit harder than it potentially should have been, but we know that Toulouse have got a lot of spirit about them, they don’t go away.

“There was a questionable sin binning and a questionable try after that but we showed a bit of courage there, which was important, but, yeah, we’re tough to watch at times.”

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Wakefield Trinity urged to improve slow starts

Part of Trinity being tough to watch was simply down to the tough conditions with the sun beating down in Toulouse, and Powell acknowledged those tricky conditions whilst highlighting a recurring issue for Wakefield.

He said: “The conditions are pretty difficult. I just felt like we could have been better at the start of both halves.

“That’s a bit of a theme for us, so we’re going to have to try and break that down, but winning games over in France is always tough.

“The conditions are difficult, it’s a kind of different atmosphere, so you have to manage all of that so I’m really pleased with the win.”

That win was cemented in the 77th minute when Ollie Pratt made a match-winning tackle on Benjamin Laguerre to stop a certain try, and Powell highlighted that moment.

The Trinity coach said: “He put his body on the line there. He got a couple of whacks during the game, so he was pretty brave all the way through, and then, yeah, that’s a great tackle that. He’s a pretty good winger, Laguerre, so he did a great job on him in the corner.”

With a week off now for the Challenge Cup Final, Wakefield will have their eyes on round 13 when they welcome Hull KR before then facing Wigan Warriors, two games that Powell said his side just improve ahead of.

“They’re very difficult games, Hull KR and Wigan, they’re in the final and they’re there for a reason,” he assessed.

“They’re awesome clubs and teams and we’ll have to put our wits against them and we’ll have to improve from that, particularly our starts. I think that’s an issue our last four games have gone behind, and haven’t started great, so without making a huge issue of it, it’s something that we need to fix up a bit.”

A big win in France for @WTrinityRL 👏#SuperLeague pic.twitter.com/6qDc7vnrJE

— Betfred Super League (@SuperLeague) May 23, 2026