Warrington Wolves key match stats from London Broncos win

And as usual, they tell us some interesting things about their victory over London Broncos – some that may have been clear to the naked eye, others less so.

The Wire’s 36-22 victory allowed them to keep the pressure on Wigan Warriors and Hull KR above them at the top of Super League as well as rebound from their loss to the Robins last weekend.

It was perhaps nervier than they would have liked, but they eventually did enough to see off a gallant effort from Super League’s bottom side.

Here’s three things we noticed from a look at the Super League match stats…

The shoe is on the other foot

The stats from last week’s loss to Hull KR showed Wire at a clear physical disadvantage when compared to their opponents.

This time, the shoe was very much on the other foot as Warrington made the advantage many expected them to have count.

From two fewer carries (162 to London’s 164), they made over 300 more metres than their opponents (1,357 compared to London’s 1,018) and on average, Wire’s carries made two metres each more than their hosts (8.4m compared to 6.2m).

They also dominated in terms of post-contact metres, making 504 compared to 386 from the Broncos, and returned kicks with much greater force – they made 91 kick return metres compared to London’s 39.

Awesome Ashton and the return of the King

Wire have coped well in his absence, but Toby King’s display showed just how much he brings to this side.

Quietly, he racked up the metres, clocking up 109m from 11 carries at an average of just under 10m each without any clean breaks to bolster the numbers.

However, coasting clear of everybody was Matty Ashton, whose man-of-the-match display saw him make a staggering 232m from nine carries, meaning he made an average of 26m every time he got the ball in his hands.

Those numbers featured the two long-range tries he scored to take him to 100 career tries and the line break assist to set up his centre King.

Matt Dufty was well on for another 200m game and no doubt would have reached that figure had he not been withdrawn before the hour mark – when he came off, he had made 148m from 17 carries.

Two London players reached three figures - full-back Josh Rourke (122m) topped their charts followed by winger Hakim Miloudi (103m).

Areas for concern

Sam Burgess will want to see Wire return to their good habit of high completion rates in the weeks to come.

Their overall number for this game was 75 per cent, with 12 errors made compared to 10 from the Broncos.

They will also want to be cleaner in the tackle, with 22 missed tackles likely to result in further punishment in games further down the line.

London were also able to have 22 play-the-balls inside the Wire 20 despite being dominated physically, largely due to the number of errors made and penalties conceded – another number which would have been asking for trouble against better opposition.