LEIGH LEOPARDS looked tremendous on Friday night in defeating Wakefield Trinity at the newly named Progress With Unity Stadium (formerly the Leigh Sports Village). 

The Leopards came out and played an almost perfect first half of rugby.

And their two most prominent stars were Lachlan Lam and Edwin Ipape.

They will now go to Wigan on Friday night and, if they play with the same intensity and smartness they demonstrated last week, they will give the Warriors plenty of problems. They certainly won’t go down 38-0, as they did at the same stage of the competition last year.

But they do have a major potential problem that they will have to overcome.

Will Lachlan be suspended by the RFL this week for two incidents that occurred in that game?

First was the incident with Wakefield’s Seth Nikotemo, who was tackled by Lachlan and had to leave the field with a facial injury.

Lachlan was penalised but not carded for that incident and I hope the incident isn’t viewed more seriously by the RFL match review panel.

The second incident later in the second half arose when Wakefield’s Mason Lino claimed to the referee Liam Moore that Lachlan had used unacceptable, abusive language to him.

It is understood that there was a  racial component to the allegation.

Without any hard evidence I would find such a suggestion very difficult to believe.

Lachlan is part Australian and part Papua New Guinean himself and, while I can imagine any player sledging an opponent, I can’t believe that any player in the modern game would resort to the racial stereotyping of an opponent.

I certainly hope not, because if any action was taken against Lachlan it might mean that he would miss the most important game in Leigh’s recent history (apart from the 2023 Challenge Cup Final) when they travel to Wigan on Friday night.

With Lachlan leading the way, they have a great chance of upsetting their hosts.

Without him, their chances would be vastly diminished.