Danny Orr pounced for a late try to seal a narrow victory and boost Wigan's hopes of avoiding relegation from the engage Super League.

The Warriors were trailing 10-8 heading into the final few minutes when stand-off Orr struck to deny Huddersfield a confidence-boosting win ahead of their Powergen Challenge Cup final date with St Helens.

In a hard-fought but scrappy game in which handling was poor from both sides, the Warriors eventually overpowered their relegation rivals to record their eighth win in nine games.

Huddersfield, by contrast, have now lost three Super League matches in a row since their heroic 30-12 cup semi-final win to plunge into relegation trouble.

Jon Sharp's side went into the game without four key players - Paul Reilly, Chris Thorman, Brad Drew and Martin Aspinwall.

Wigan were missing Brett Dallas and Chris Radlinski but showed plenty of urgency in the opening exchanges.

Scoring opportunities, though, were scarce in the first 15 minutes as both sides struggled to retain the ball in the wet conditions.

The Giants broke the deadlock in the 17th minute when Nathan McAvoy spilled Robbie Paul's high cross-field kick and Kevin Brown - on loan from Wigan until the end of the season - was on hand to pounce, Michael De Vere converting.

The Warriors' response was immediate as they marched upfield and Australian second row forward Bryan Fletcher powered over from the play-the-ball, Michael Dobson tagging on the extras.

De Vere and Dobson exchanged penalties to make the scores 8-8 but both sides squandered try-scoring chances either side of half-time and it took until the 60th minute for the next score, when De Vere's penalty made it 10-8.

A string of handling errors from both sides led to a scrappy but exciting finish before Orr sealed the game in the 73rd minute, Dobson making no mistake with the conversion.