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EORL CRABTREE knows the Giants will come back stronger from their bitter experiences at Wigan and Warrington.

Huddersfield were hammered 46-12 at the Warriors 16 days ago and then lost 28-16 against the Wolves at the Halliwell Jones Stadium on Friday night.

As a result, the third-placed Giants have lost ground on the top two, with leaders Wigan five points ahead of coach Nathan Brown’s men and Warrington four.

But despite the Giants being second best in both top-of-the-table clashes and clearly losing the forward battle, the 28-year-old England prop is remaining positive.

And he knows his club’s Super League XVI season is far from over.

“What happened at Warrington the other night was pretty hard to take,” said Crabtree.

“To be honest, we were all a bit down over the way things went. We’ve got a decent recent record against Warrington and we were confident we could give it a really good go.

“But it just didn’t happen for us.

“We pride ourselves on being able to dominate sides in the competition, but against Wigan and now Warrington that’s not been the case. They both got one over us.

“There were contributory factors to this, particularly the Warrington game. In the first half (when the Giants were outplayed and were lucky to be just 22-0 behind) we coughed up too much ball and gave away far too many penalties.

“Because of that, we ended up making twice as many tackles as they did, and that takes a lot of energy out of you. Against a side like Warrington, that’s asking for trouble.

“But in the second half we started to respect possession, hold on to the ball and started to dominate. That’s why we got it back to 20-16 before they grabbed a late winning try off another of our errors.

“So we know exactly where it went wrong and what it takes to turn it around, because we saw it all at Warrington the other night.

“We showed what we can do if we get our fair share of possession. That’s the lesson to learn, and when we do we’ll be right back up there.”

Crabtree also re-emphasised the fact that the defeats to the top two doesn’t mean the Giants are a spent force.

“We’re still third in the competition, so we must be doing something right,” added Crabtree.

“Every side suffers the odd dip in form during the course of a season and, unfortunately for us, it’s come when we’ve been playing at Wigan and Warrington.

“But we’ve also had some good, solid wins during this time, with the victory over an impressive Catalan Dragons side in Halifax the other week being a prime example.

“As I’ve said, we know exactly where we went wrong against Warrington the other night and are determined to work hard to ensure there’s no repeat.

“Our confidence is still high and we’re looking forward to learning the lessons from the Warrington game and finishing the season as strongly as possible. We’re certainly already looking forward to going to Bradford on Sunday.”