Friday’s game at the Jungle in Betfred Super League round 14 is the sides’ fourth meeting this year and Tigers have lost all three so far. They were beaten 32-4 at home and 36-14 away in Super League and 60-6 in Challenge Cup tie on their own turf.
That is an aggregate of 128-24 and it’s no surprise Lingard isn’t thrilled at facing the current league, cup and World Club champions yet again. “With the greatest respect, I am sick of seeing them,” he admitted.
“I know we played them once in the Cup as well, which has added to the fixture list, but for me you shouldn’t play a team three times in the league before you play another team once. I just think it’s a little bit daft.”
In Super League, sides face some opponents on an extra occasion to make a 27-game season from a 12-team competition, but Lingard stressed: “I am not a massive fan of loop fixtures anyway. My thoughts have always been ‘get it to a 14-team league and play everyone home and away’. That’s 26 games and it’s all done and dusted. When you are playing some teams three times and some twice, it gives a lopsided fixture list. I think it should be even across the board.”
Wigan will be close to full-strength just six days after their Wembley triumph, with only Jai Field dropping out from the side which lifted the Challenge Cup against Warrington Wolves. Lingard, who will give a debut to on-loan Huddersfield Giants forward Matty English, expects the visitors to be at their best, despite a week of celebrations, but is more concerned with how his men play.
Tigers were thumped 32-4 at Leeds Rhinos in their most recent outing, two weeks ago and Lingard is looking for an “all-round improvement in every area”. He said: “We can’t go into any game flat, certainly not against Wigan.
“When we’ve been good this year we’ve had at least 50 per cent possession of the ball. If we have a third of the ball and the opposition have two-thirds, defensively we are put under the pump, we’re not coming through periods of adversity and we crumble.
“It’s a real key element for us, to ensure we get that. That means we’ve got to complete our sets, end our sets further down the field and then back our defensive efforts.
“When we do that well, we put ourselves in a position to win games. If we don’t, we end up defending our own goalline more often than not and that’s when we are coming unstuck. We’ve got to make sure we deal better with periods of adversity.”
Castleford Tigers: from Hooley, Wood, I Senior, Miller, Watts, El-Zakhem, Mellor, Horne, Griffin, Milnes, Putt, Hodson, S Hall, Namo, Qareqare, Robb, Kibula, G Hill, Hoy, C Hall, English.
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