WILL it be Dazza, Daryl or D Clark on the back of the number nine Warrington Wolves shirt next season?

The man himself was laughing about it when news broke earlier this week that The Wire have signed his namesake Jason Clark from South Sydney Rabbitohs for 2019 and beyond.

However that pans out, Daryl Clark is looking forward to the prospect of playing alongside the NRL forward.

“I’ve watched quite a bit of the NRL and I saw him play quite a bit last year, not as much this year, but he looks a pretty strong player,” he said.

“He runs the ball really well, he looks strong, it looks like he’s got a good offload game as well so hopefully he can bring that to us and strengthen what I think is already a good pack.”

Clark is on fire for The Wire in 2018 and is enjoying himself in what is his fourth season at The Halliwell Jones Stadium since leaving Castleford Tigers.

“It’s the same as anything, when you’re winning it’s really easy to enjoy your game,” said the 25-year-old going into tomorrow’s top-four battle against his old club.

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“But when you’re losing as we saw last year it can put a downer on it.

“Everything’s good in camp at the minute. I’m happy with how the team’s going, happy with how I’m going myself. Hopefully we can keep winning and keep playing well.”

The lift in all of the players’ performances in the 23-0 victory against Wigan Warriors was clear to see compared with the 38-10 trouncing by Shaun Wane’s men at St James’ Park, Newcastle, a fortnight earlier during the Magic Weekend.

“After what they did to us at the Magic Weekend, when they outplayed us and embarrassed us to a certain extent, we spoke about it all week that we wanted to put that right,” said Clark.

“We wanted to play tough and strong, and try to do what they did to us back to them - and I feel like we did that.”

At the start of the year Clark highlighted that some little plays around the play-the-ball were to be added to his repertoire for this season.

Many will have spotted some of the more obvious ones, including the inside drop-off pass to a rampaging Ben Murdoch-Masila close to the try line.

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Others are designed for Clark to be able to use his speed dashing out of dummy-half.

“We have our little plays just to create the ruck speed and make it fast, to leave people on the floor which is ideal for my game,” he said.

“Hopefully that can keep going and we can keep putting them little combinations on to keep helping me.”

He says he enjoys playing against his former club, although memories of the ‘watersplash’ clash at the Mend-a-Hose Jungle on Easter Monday left him rolling his eyes as he spoke.

“The water game? That was the worst conditions I’ve ever played in,” said Clark.

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FLASHBACK: More of Mike Boden's memorable pictures from the 18-6 win at Castleford

“The weather’s turned for the better, we should have a better spectacle this time round and hopefully a lot more rugby will get played.”

“We’ve got a lot of fast, skilful players and weather like this gives them a chance to showcase that.

“It’s the same for Castleford, with the way they play too, so I think it should be a good entertaining game on Friday.

“I played a lot of academy and reserve grade at Castleford, so I know a lot of the guys who are still playing.

“It’s always good to play against your hometown club and against a lot of people I grew up playing with.”

In recent matches Clark has taken a break in matches, moving out of dummy-half and into the loose-forward role.

That has allowed Dec Patton, who signed a new two-year contract yesterday, to make an impact off the bench too and give the team further spark.

“He’s been playing really well so you need to get him in there somewhere, so if that means me moving to 13 for 10 or 15 minutes then I’m more than happy to do that,” said Clark.

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Dec Patton scoring the last try against Wigan on Saturday. Picture by Mike Boden

“He knows all the plays. Having trained at ‘half’ all year, all the plays from 9 are pretty similar.

“He has a good passing game, a good eye for the plays and squaring to the line, so I think it’s suited him really well.”

Generally, Clark, who must be a contender for the England squad that flies out to America to play New Zealand in Denver later this month, is enjoying his time in Warrington and has another two years on his current contract.

Recently buying another house in the area shows how he has settled into life away from Yorkshire.

“I’ve moved house, just round the corner from the one I was in - a little bit of an upgrade,” he said.

“I only travelled to training from Yorkshire each day for the first month after signing for Warrington.

“Initially I was going to travel, but I was late by about two hours for the first day so that was it then – my mind was made up the first day.

“I’ve been moved over for about three-and-a-half years. I’m happy, settled and enjoying it.”