Karl Pratt has vowed to return ahead of schedule from the shoulder injury that derailed his outstanding early-season campaign.

The utility back was training this week, his arm still in a sling following the complete shoulder reconstruction he underwent three weeks ago.

It was the fourth shoulder operation for the 22-year-old, who had only just returned from an off-season operation, where pins were inserted to help stabilise his problem

shoulder.

But he's not letting the setback get him down.

"I'll come back bigger and better and stronger from this as a person and a player," he said.

"The specialist told me I'd be out between ten and 12 weeks and it has been three now. I'll try to cut it down to eight. I've had four operations now on my shoulders and this is the worst one that I've had. But I've always come back early and I've always made it my goal to come back early. I'd like to think that I can do it again."

Pratt was outstanding deputising for injured scrum half Paul Deacon against Penrith and, had it not been for Lesley Vainikolo's five tries, would have been man of the match against Wigan.

"All anybody wants to do is play consistently," he said. "For the first two competitive games I thought I stood up and did all right. It was a good base to start from. This is just a knock back."

A rugged defender, Pratt put in some solid hits against Wigan, but it was an innocuous challenge after he was wrong-footed by Gareth Hock that did the damage.

"It was a tackle where I got my feet wrong going into a collision," he said.

"It was one of their smaller players who I'd lined up for a big shot. But he came on the other shoulder and I was left a bit isolated so it was just a matter of a grab and sticking my arm out but I came out second best.

"It didn't give me too much pain at the time but as the week went on it just became unbearable. I went to see the specialist and found out I needed quite a bit of surgery."

The only good news for Pratt was that when the specialist examined his shoulder he found that his previous injuries had all fully healed.

"They were fine. It was a completely different injury. I was expecting at first that one of the pins had come loose but that wasn't the case. In hindsight I might have been better off if something had come loose, rather than this full reconstruction."