5 Talking Points From Saints 16 Catalans Dragons 35

The Wait Goes On

When the draw for the Challenge Cup semi-finals was made in early June there was a very audible cheer from the Saints fans who had stayed behind after the quarter-final victory over Hull FC. Catalans Dragons were the plum draw at the time, struggling as they were in the lower reaches of Super League and not looking like getting it together any time soon. Warrington and Leeds were the other sides in the hat and with Wire showing this year that they are a genuine contender for major honours and Leeds having what Australians call the wood over Saints in finals there was only one side that Saints fans wanted to face.

When they got their wish it was thought that the 10-year wait for a Challenge Cup final would finally end. A decade is far too long for a club of Saints standing to go without a Wembley appearance but now that figure will rise to 11 years. The wait will go on after a quite disastrous first half at Bolton. Saints went in to listen to Justin Holbrook’s words of advice 27-0 down, a score-line which haunted anyone who was at Wembley to see Saints humiliated by Wigan by that score in 1989 and one which left Saints with little hope of a comeback yesterday. Even Saints, a side who should never be written off, were never realistically in with a chance of recovering from that kind of deficit and so it proved. They were competitive in the second half and perhaps even arguably slightly better than the Dragons, but the damage had already been done.

It’s Not Only About Ben

Prime target for the Saints fans ire on social media was star turn and Man Of Steel elect Ben Barba. The Australian fullback had a pretty dire afternoon, showing his defensive vulnerability while also failing to show any of the devastating skill and pace that has torn so many teams apart in 2018. To this observer he looked unfit and short of conditioning. The searing heat seemed to be making life even more difficult for him. At times he would threaten to come to life, squirming out of a tackle but then not having that extra gear of pace to move into to take him away from the defence. On the one occasion that he did break free he seemed to lack the confidence to go on with it, instead trying to place a grubber down the left hand side only to see the ball hit the ground before he could get his foot to it.

But while Barba had a bit of a Joe Cocker he was not alone. The awful truth is that probably only this column’s favourite player Louie McCarthy-Scarsbrook came out of this debacle with any real credit. This game was lost largely because the Saints pack, still missing the influential Alex Walmsley, was battered from the proverbial pillar to post for most of the first half. Luke Thompson had one early break but aside from that most of the Saints pack seemed to lack any real go-forward. By contrast the Dragons forwards made metres on almost every play, consistently winning the collisions and the rucks and then translating that dominance into points as the normally rigid Saints defence rather wilted in the heat.

The sin-binning of Morgan Knowles for a lazy high lunge on Kenny Edwards hardly helped. Knowles has previous in the field of indiscipline against the French side, seeing red for a dangerous throw when the teams met in the league in Perpignan back in February. Saints won that game despite Knowles indiscipline but could not repeat the trick, conceding two more tries while down to 12 men and effectively waving goodbye to their cup hopes for another year.

For all of that we shouldn’t worry too much about Barba. There were murmurings were I was sat and on social media about how he has lost interest in the club and isn’t trying and all manner of over-emotional gubbins. I’m one of those who did not expect him to stay beyond the end of 2018 when he arrived and I would still say that that outcome is where the smart money is. But given what he has provided us with this year and how he has taken the club and the town to his heart I cannot find it in me to believe that he has just thrown in the towel. Even if he has designs on a move back to the NRL, heck, even if he has already secured one, do we not think that he would want to make sure that he leaves these shores with a Wembley appearance? If he does go home then this was his only chance to do that. I don’t think he struggled for motivation and I don’t think he will struggle for motivation to get us to Old Trafford and pick up the big one. Those writing off our hopes after this result would do well to remember that we are 10 points clear at the top of the table and are still a firm favourite to win in Manchester in October.

And It Is Not Only About Justin

Those not blaming Barba were pointing the finger at Holbrook for the defeat. It was suggested that his relative inexperience as a coach found him out. Yet nobody was saying that about him last week, when a last-gasp win over Warrington left the coach with a record of 21 wins from 23 regular season games. He has overseen victories against every other Super League team in 2018, with nobody until yesterday coming up with a game-plan that he was unable to respond to. He has also, until yesterday, instilled a winning mentality in the squad which has ensured that even when the performance levels dip the results do not suffer. Holbrook teams by and large find a way to win.

So what could he have done differently? The loss of Ryan Morgan in the week leading up to the game went almost unnoticed but was a significant blow. Tommy Makinson is a capable replacement but no back can do an effective job when the pack is being blitzed, much less one who is really only there as a stop-gap. Makinson’s tendency to crab across the field is infuriating whereas Morgan, for all that he is not exactly a top class NRL import, is at least more direct which may have helped.

Another option Holbrook had at his disposal was to leave Barba out. I’ve alluded to the notion that Barba may not have been 100% fit and if that was the case there is a solid argument that he should not have played. Jonny Lomax is an international fullback about whom we should have no worries should he get the nod to start there. Theo Fages could then have come in at stand-off and spared himself the indignity of getting run over at loose forward by the much bigger Dragons pack. Fages is willing to tackle anything but whether or not he is able to do so is open to question. Was it wise to utilise him in the middle against such a powerful pack especially when it was quite clear that we were being outgunned in that area? All hindsight genius of course, and had Holbrook been brave enough to leave Barba out and the result had gone the same way anyway you don’t need a PHD to know what the reaction from the fans would have been.

Catalans Keep It Simple

Despite the flaws in Saints performance you cannot take it away from Catalans and their coach Steve McNamara. Widely viewed, including by this writer, as a negative and uninspiring appointment by the Dragons McNamara presided over a disastrous first half of the season, amusingly blaming it on the number of Dragons players who had been involved in the World Cup. Meanwhile, a Saints side which had 11 players on duty in the autumn jamboree has led the Super League table pretty much from the get-go.

How far they have travelled since then. Coming into this semi-final the Dragons had preserved their Super League status for 2019 by winning seven of their last 10 league games since losing 26-12 at Saints in early May. Still few fancied their chances of springing a surprise against a Saints side that had not lost since mid-April. During that run there have been some scary moments for Saints. The three-point win over Hull FC in the last round of the cup was one, when two FC players were crucially sin-binned. Then there was a one-point victory at a struggling Leeds side when Danny Richardson kicked the winning drop-goal late in the game. And it was Richardson again who rescued Saints even later last week at home to Warrington with a 55-metre penalty to earn a 14-12 win to edge Saints nearer to the League Leaders Shield. Yet even with these scratchy wins there would have been few people expecting Saints to be blown away by what is still an average Super League outfit in the Dragons.

McNamara deserves credit not only for the winning run his side have been on but for getting his game plan absolutely spot on against Holbrook’s men. It wasn’t all that expansive, certainly not the sort of rugby that would keep your average Saints fan off the forums palpitating about the lack of entertainment on show. But it was effective. A forward-based game. Win the ruck, tackle hard, force mistakes, don’t make many in possession. It worked a treat. Catalans completion rate was markedly higher than Saints in that first half and that gap got bigger as Saints became more desperate in the second half and started to force the ball wider more often. They had little choice but to do that having been battered so badly in the middle of the field. They were never going to bridge a 27-point gap by playing conservatively. Conversely the Dragons forced their hand by playing the percentages and being more physical on the day. You can have all the razzle dazzle in the world in your side but if you get beaten physically you are probably going to have a very long day.

When Will The RFL Get Access Right?

I hate to use this platform to moan about disability access but you’ll appreciate that it is one of the few effective ways I have to raise awareness of these issues. I will try and cut this long story short by telling you first of all that I was unable to buy tickets for the semi-final double header from Saints, instead being directed to the RFL. All of the other clubs taking part sold accessible tickets to their fans but for reasons that I still have not been able to ascertain Saints did not. They did at least reserve places for season ticket holders, passing on the responsibility for the actual ticket sales to the governing body. No doubt they were wary of irrepressible keyboard warriors getting awfully close to pointing out that to fail to at least reserve space would be to strip member rights away from those who need accessible seating.

So I left it at that initially, slightly miffed that the club had forced me to go through the RFL but thankful that they had at least managed to secure my place among the Saints fans. I didn’t want to go through a repeat of the 2014 Grand Final when I was in among several thousand very upset Wiganers. It was amusing in one respect but actually I would much rather have celebrated that win with like-minded individuals, not screaming knicker-wetters bemoaning the luck of poor old Bennie Flower.

But then I got to the stadium in and the inability of anyone connected with rugby league to cater for the disabled shone through once more. In order to allow me to sit in close proximity to other Saints fans without having to settle for a ground level view they placed me behind a sound-proof sheet of plexi-glass. The sound from the crowd was coming in through a speaker, making it all feel like you were not really there at all. In addition, my partner who accompanied me to the game (not my carer, that is a job you don’t want) had to sit on a high chair three feet behind me. The message is clear here that if you are disabled you should not expect to be able to sit next to the person you are with at Bolton Wanderers. It’s almost as if they wonder why you would need to, since they are only there to ‘care’ for you and couldn’t possibly have any personal relationship with you. Similar arrangements exist at Liverpool’s Empire Theatre. I haven’t been there for that reason. The argument that it doesn’t matter because that person gets in for free at many venues does not wash. I would much rather pay for my partner’s ticket and enjoy the experience. Because yeah, I’m a human being, like.

The upshot of all of this is that we left at the end of the Saints game. I had told myself that I would not do that, that I would stay and watch the Warrington-Leeds game no matter what result of the Saints game. Those conditions changed my mind. I would be better off watching the other game in the pub down the road, which is what I did before heading back to the hotel.

Now I don’t know if I am alone among wheelchair users and those with mobility problems in expressing my displeasure at the set-up. Some may have been satisfied with what they were provided with but I just feel that since we are paying the same price as everyone else we should be given access to the same experience. That does not mean being made to feel like you are not really there at all. I would very much like to hear from anyone else who was behind the soundproof sheet yesterday to find out whether they think this is an acceptable way to treat disabled fans. I hope they do not, because if you accept shite you will get fed more of it. It is time to stand up, metaphorically, and do something about this.