{"id":616543,"date":"2026-06-02T06:09:19","date_gmt":"2026-06-02T06:09:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/616543\/"},"modified":"2026-06-02T06:09:19","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T06:09:19","slug":"warrington-wolves-george-williams-injury-return-date-revealed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/616543\/","title":{"rendered":"Warrington Wolves: George Williams’ injury return date revealed"},"content":{"rendered":"

George Williams will return for Warrington Wolves in the final few weeks of the season before captaining England at this autumn\u2019s Rugby League World Cup, Brian McDermott has confirmed.<\/p>\n

Wire and England skipper Williams suffered a complex neck injury during a Super League<\/a> clash over in France against Catalans Dragons in mid-April.<\/p>\n

Requiring surgery, the half-back\u2019s initial prognosis remained unclear, with the possibility he may have played his last game in the primrose and blue with a deal agreed to return to the NRL<\/a> next season as he joins the Dolphins.<\/p>\n

But the experienced playmaker will now return before the end of this season, it\u2019s been revealed, with all eyes on the business end of the campaign.<\/p>\n

\u2018There\u2019s a window of about two or three weeks that he\u2019s going to be back before the end of the regular season\u2019<\/p>\n

Warrington<\/a> are, of course, aiming to be involved in the Super League Grand Final on October 3. That showpiece comes exactly a fortnight before England\u2019s opening game of the World Cup in Perth against Tonga on October 17.<\/p>\n

Newly-appointed England head coach Brian McDermott featured as a guest on James Graham\u2019s The Bye Round podcast<\/a>, and addressed Williams\u2019 fitness.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cI am (expecting him to be ready for the first game).<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve talked to George a couple of times now, I wanted to share with him some of the plans I\u2019ve got, specifically about attack.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a good chat with him, and I\u2019ve never really spoken to him (before) other than shaking his hand after games.<\/p>\n

\u201cI usually shake George\u2019s hand and say, \u2018you little b*stard\u2019, because he\u2019s done great against my teams!<\/p>\n

\u201cOne phone call was him telling me he was having an operation the following week, but for whatever reason, that got put back.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a window of about two or three weeks that he\u2019s going to be back before the end of the regular season, and then if Warrington are in the finals (play-offs), he\u2019s got a couple of extra games after that.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s another couple of weeks of preparation, which includes flying out to Australia, so I\u2019m confident he\u2019ll be there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018He\u2019s well respected and matured into a leader\u2019<\/p>\n

Crowned a Super League champion twice during his time with hometown club Wigan Warriors, playmaker Williams will turn 32 at the end of October.<\/p>\n

He has held the captaincy of the national team since 2023, with that accolade bestowed upon him by England<\/a>\u2018s former head coach Shaun Wane.<\/p>\n

McDermott had already confirmed Williams would retain the captaincy when he was first appointed, and told former England international Graham: \u201cThere\u2019s no reason to change that with George.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s well respected and matured into a leader over the last four or five seasons.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s renowned for not saying too much, but when he gets the ball in his hands, you better be good because he\u2019ll find you if you\u2019re not in your defensive line.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s got a bit more about his game at the moment with some of that leadership that he\u2019s been working on over the last two or three seasons, you can see that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"George Williams will return for Warrington Wolves in the final few weeks of the season before captaining England…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":616544,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-616543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-rugby","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=616543"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616543\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/616544"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=616543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=616543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=616543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}