WOLVES kept their slim top-eight hopes alive with a crushing victory over Leigh Centurions that featured four tries from Tom Lineham.

He scored the last two of the first half as The Wire assembled a winning 24-6 cushion and added two more late on after Australian Ben Pomeroy marked his debut with a second-half score.

Wolves conceded successive early penalties as the game opened but turned things around quickly with a powerful surge from Ryan Atkins off a lovely Dec Patton pass.

Atkins became Super League's joint sixth highest try scorer of all time with his fifth-minute effort converted by Stefan Ratchford.

Ben Westwood, on his return from a broken hand, went to the sin bin for a dangerous tackle on Danny Tickle, who was making his 400th Super League appearance.

Not only did Wire hang on in defence during the 10-minute period, they extended their lead with a Ratchford penalty goal.

And just as Westwood returned to the fray Ashton Sims crossed on the left after Lineham palmed backwards a kick from Patton.

With Ratchford adding the extras, Wolves led 14-0 after 19 minutes.

Then it was time for Lineham to turn from provider to executor – twice.

On both occasions Patton fed full-back Ratchford and pinpoint passes allowed the wingman to acrobatically diver over in the corner, with one of the two attempts converted.

With the final act of the half a Ben Reynolds kick deceived Ratchford and he followed up himself to cross and convert to leave the score at 24-6 at the break.

Wire held out for successive sets on their own line at the start of the second half as Leigh attempted to further reduce the gap.

It felt like another Wire try would kill the contest though and some lovely work by Peta Hiku in the centre role on his home debut provided the score that was needed.

His dancing feet created space for himself to slip a pass out of the tackle for Pomeroy to walk over.

Ratchford converted to extend the lead to 30-6 after 48 minutes.

Lineham completed his hat-trick in the 67th minute in very different style to his first two scores.

He accepted an inside ball from Ratchford and barged over the line through three defenders, somehow managing to get the ball down in the process.

A powerful surge from Hughes extended the lead before a brief response from Matty Dawson from an overlap created on the right by Leigh.

That still left enough time for Lineham to twist out of a two-man tackle for his fourth try to give The Wire their highest score in a match this season.

And not satisfied with that, Ratchford broke clear to put Patton over with a slide on the wet surface.

Westwood took over the kicking duties to bring the match to a halt with the 50-point milestone reached.

Wolves remain three points off a top eight position following Huddersfield's win at home to Widnes tonight.