Powell blasts 'poor' Wolves | Romano earns plaudits

Daryl Powell called on his Warrington Wolves players to toughen up in time for the derby with St Helens after they slumped to a 24-18 home defeat by Catalans Dragons.

The Dragons brushed off the absence of nine players to secure a first away win over the Wolves for 11 years and inflict a first defeat of the season on Powell's full-strength team.

Warrington's next task is to visit the unbeaten Betfred Super League champions in front of the Sky Sports cameras on Friday, March 11 and the head coach is demanding rapid improvements from his team.

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"That was poor, right from the start," Powell said. "It was disappointing on every level and I have just made the players aware it is not acceptable. That kind of performance has to change, in their heads now.

"It's been coming, you could see that last week, the mentality has got to change, 100 per cent. We've just not got going yet. I know we've won three games but there has been no flow to our game.

"We've got to fix ourselves up pretty quick and I'm expecting a response straight away from the players next week, that's as tough a test as it gets. It's a tough challenge ahead and we need the boys to be tougher than they are at the moment."

Mitchell Pearce scored his first Super League try and his half-back partner Josh Drinkwater produced a kicking masterclass as the Dragons followed up their notable win at Leeds with an even more impressive away victory.

Already without Sam Tomkins, Michael McIlorum and a trio of other front-row forwards through injury and suspension, the Dragons lost French Test winger Fouad Yaha with a hamstring injury in the warm-up.

But Australian utility player Tyrone May proved to be a