Reece Lyne is the only Wakefield player featuring on Thursday who played the last time Trinity defeated Castleford - SEVEN years ago.
He helped inflict a late 24-22 victory over their derby rivals at Wheldon Road in 2015. But Wakefield have somehow lost all 16 meetings since. England centre Lyne, 29, said: “All of those came when Daryl Powell was in charge at Cas and he seemed to have the edge over us.
“But we’ve just turned his Warrington team over two weeks running! Cas always had a really good side. You had Luke Dorn who often caused us lots of problems then you had players like Rangi Chase, Luke Gale and Denny Solomona. They always seemed to have real strong sides while we’d often be in building phases.
"There were a few games where we were in front and things have just gone away from us. But that 2015 game is still in my memory - Danny Washbrook scored late on to get it for us. It’s a great memory, winning a big derby like that, and it’s definitely time we did it again.”
Current Trinity captain Jacob Miller also played that night but he remains injured after sitting out Sunday’s Challenge Cup quarter-final loss against Wigan. Ironically, Castleford skipper Paul McShane was Wakefield’s hooker when they won in 2015 and Tigers team-mate Daniel Smith was also in the Trinity side. Wakefield’s four-game winning run came to an end against Wigan but they had fought hard for an hour and dominated the first half despite trailing 12-6.
Lyne said: “It was a real intense game. We had a really strong start but didn’t turn our opportunities into points. We had all that field position but unfortunately couldn’t break them down.
“Wigan have some great players and their bench made a big impact, too, so we eventually came unstuck. But we’re looking forward to Thursday and facing Cas down here.”
Castleford - who have won just twice in Super League under new boss Lee Radford - were also knocked out of the Challenge Cup by Hull KR, a defeat that came at a heavy price. Centre Jordan Turner suffered a shoulder injury which could rule him out for the rest of the season while winger Bureta Faraimo suffered a knee problem that might sideline him for eight weeks.
