DARYL POWELL praised Mason Lino for recovering his nerve to seal a “crazy” game for Wakefield Trinity.
The Samoan halfback scored a brilliant 78th-minute try and then converted it to defeat world champions Hull KR 26-24 on an emotional day at DIY Kitchens Stadium.
But Lino, who was playing his 100th Super League game, had earlier missed a simple conversion attempt, got sin-binned for forearming Joe Burgess and also blew a glorious chance to make it 22-6 before half-time.
Trinity had scored back-to-back tries via Cameron Scott and Josh Rourke to charge 16-6 ahead when captain Mike McMeeken strode through the middle of KR’s bedraggled defence.
Lino had an opportunity to find Oli Pratt for his second try but his wayward pass went behind the winger and into touch to let Rovers off the hook.
Instead, the visitors marched down the field and scored themselves via Jai Whitbread to make it 16-12 at the break and they went ahead for the first time via Tyrone May in the 65th minute.
Powell admitted: “Yes, I spoke to him (Lino) at half-time, saying if he ices that then the game looks completely different.
“But they score on the next set after that. It meant we weren’t further ahead at half-time, but that’s the way the game went.
“There were a couple of goal kicks that he would have probably felt he should have scored.
“There was particularly one of them he would have wanted to have nailed.
“And that probably impacted my decision-making a little when we got a penalty, and we go after points where maybe I would have gone for two.
“I didn’t think his confidence was that high. To then do that at the end, though, it was great.
“I asked him if he was nervous on the field at the end. He said no, he was sweet. I’ll take his word for it!”
Powell said the manner of the victory was a good way to pay tribute to former Wakefield coach John Kear.
“To win it in the way we did was probably fitting of the day as a whole. John would have loved that,” he said.
“It was a big game for us, an emotional day, and we managed to pull something out of them. I’m really pleased.”