DEFENCE has been “a big focus” for The Wire in their preparations for today’s trip to Wakefield Trinity, prop Joe Philbin.

Warrington will be aiming to avoid back-to-back defeats when they take on Chris Chester’s side at Belle Vue.

Philbin says the squad are wary of their hard work coming undone and they are determined to make sure that does not happen.

The 23-year-old insists his side will be better defensively than they were in last Friday’s defeat to Castleford Tigers.

“It was a very disappointing result against Cas and a lot of heads were down after it,” he said.

“It is a new week now, though. Our minds are fully on Wakefield this week and putting right the wrongs from last week.

“They had a good win against Wigan, so we need to focus fully on them.

“Our defence was way below where we mark ourselves. That has been a big focus this week.

“Wakefield have a few big guys and some very good attacking players, so we have to be right on it in defence on Sunday.

“We need to get back to winning ways to stop this becoming a slump.

“We’ve done a lot of hard work to get where we are, so we don’t want that to come undone because of a couple of slack performances.

“The defence will need to be a lot better than it was against Castleford, and it will be.”

Wakefield go into the game fresh from beating second-placed Wigan at home last week, while leaders St Helens also left Belle Vue empty-handed in April.

Philbin says there is plenty for his side to guard against but is looking forward to the challenge of going up against Trinity’s powerful pack.

“Going away to any team in this league is tough, and Wakefield is just the same,” he said.

“They will throw a lot of challenges at us, but we will be up for whatever comes our way.

“They have a few big players so it will be a good challenge for us as a forward pack to go up against them.”