WARRINGTON Wolves are understood to be making preparations to remove a player from their wage bill after this week’s signings of Mickey Higham and Garreth Carvell.

Wolves announced the captures of the Great Britain international pair two days after their disappointing 46-8 play-off exit to Catalans Dragons on Saturday.

Higham had long been expected to join the club as a direct replacement for impact hooker Mark Gleeson, who signed for Halifax in July.

The former St Helens player turns 28 today, Thursday, and will join Wolves on a two-year deal when his Wigan contract expires at the end of November.

But Wolves also moved swiftly at the end of last week to fend off competition from Bradford and St Helens to capture Carvell on a three-year deal.

The 28-year-old prop, who is in England’s train-on squad for the World Cup, was under contract with Hull so a fee - undisclosed but believed to be in the vicinity of £60,000 - was needed to secure the transfer, which takes place with immediate effect.

That late move, requested by Jimmy Lowes to bolster a Wolves squad hit hard by injuries during the past three seasons, means the club will have to ship out a first-team squad member to comply with salary cap restrictions.

Wolves did have a small amount of salary cap money to spare in 2008 but not enough to capture a player of Carvell’s stature.

However, the big names are not thought to be affected by this week’s developments and Wolves may opt to use the loan system rather than simply releasing a player, with every member of the squad currently under contract for 2009.

On the double signing, Wolves benefactor Simon Moran said: “They’re top class UK players.

“We’ve beaten off a lot of top clubs to sign Garreth Carvell. There was strong competition for him.

“I had a chat with Jimmy and he felt that we needed strengthening.

“Garreth is a strong player and hopefully he’ll be with England at the World Cup.

“When someone like him is available you want to try to get him. He will be a big boost for us.

“Mickey will give us another dimension.

“Jimmy was keen to have him here and he will provide competition.

“He’s got a lot of good attributes and he will add to the squad.”