Saturday 9th February 2013, 17:45 - Round:2

Former Hull KR winger Ben Cockayne condemned his old team-mates to their second defeat in two matches and helped Wakefield Trinity Wildcats atone for their opening 40-6 rout by Bradford Bulls.

The Robins, who had looked down and out after trailing 18-0 and 24-10, clawed their way back to within four points but Cockayne ended their fightback with a hat-trick of match-clinching tries in the last 20 minutes.

Wildcats coach Richard Agar had labelled the performance against the Bulls as the worst since he took charge but the return of 2012 player of the year Tim Smith and ever-reliable prop Andy Raleigh helped transform them.

However, until Cockayne's late burst, it seemed the sin-binning of Hull KR's Graeme Horne and Wakefield's Danny Kirmond were going to prove the pivotal moments.

Wakefield scored 18 points with a man advantage, while the visitors responded with 10 when their opponents were down to 12 men.

Already without six members of their senior squad, Rovers lost makeshift stand-off Lincoln Withers in the very first tackle of the match.

The game was held up for four and a half minutes to enable Withers to receive treatment for a head injury, the result of an attempted tackle on Wakefield prop Justin Poore that went badly wrong.

The Robins re-shuffled and looked to have overcome the shock when left winger David Hodgson raced for the corner after collecting Michael Dobson's pinpoint kick only for Wakefield centre Dean Collis to pull off a try-saving tackle.

A decisive twist followed on 16 minutes when Horne was sin-binned after referee Steve Ganson had issued the visitors with a final warning for persistent infringements.

The Wildcats were already starting to get on top and they used the extra man with telling effect to run in three converted tries during Horne's 10-minute absence.

Hooker Paul Aiton opened the scoring, taking Smith's offload just short of the line to dive over while centre Reece Lyne received full-back Richard Mathers' pass and slipped through a gap for his first try for the club on his home debut.

It got even better for Wakefield when skipper Kirmond broke through the Rovers line and produced a kick that bounced immaculately into the hands of the onrushing Peter Fox.

Paul Sykes landed all three conversions to make it 18-0 but Hull KR looked a different side when restored to their full complement and hit back with two tries before half-time.

Second rower Cory Paterson, the club's close-season recruit from North Queensland, took a pass from Craig Hall to touch down and then returned the compliment by putting the full-back over.

Dobson succeeded with one of his conversion attempts to trim the deficit to eight points but the fightback was cut short when Smith and Mathers combined to get Collis over for Wakefield's fourth try within three minutes of the restart.

The Wildcats lost prop Kyle Amor a minute later after a collision with Rovers second rower Con Mika, who was put on report, and they were down to 12 men shortly afterwards when Kirmond was sin-binned for laying on in the tackle.

It was the Robins' turn to take advantage of their extra man as they struck back with two tries in nine minutes.

Hooker Josh Hodgson forced his way over from dummy half and, after debutant Dale Ferguson knocked on over the line, winger David Hodgson touched down Dobson's kick to the corner.

That made it 24-20 but the Wildcats made sure of the points when Cockayne went over for two tries in eight minutes, with the influential Smith involved in both scores.

The left winger then finished off a break by Fox to complete his hat-trick three minutes from the end.