5 Talking Points From Wigan Warriors 10 Saints 36

Sport Hurts

It was another bruising derby despite the comfortable margin of victory and nobody could testify to that more than Tom Davies. We’d already seen Mark Percival leave the action with a hamstring injury when the Wigan winger suffered a terrible double leg break in what looked a fairly innocuous tackle. It’s a savage blow to Wigan who are already without the likes of Liam Farrell, Jarrod Sammut, Dan Sarginson and Dom Manfredi through injury while Sam Powell and Gabe Hamlin are experiencing more self-inflicted absences. Sean O’Loughlin, normally Jesus In Reverse because he rises from the dead on Good Friday, was only fit enough for a place on the bench alongside Joe Greenwood.

Yet the cruellest blow was to Davies himself who now faces months of rehab and a lengthy spell away from the real on-field action. Nobody likes to see any player sustain such a sickening injury and I’m sure all Saints fans will join me in wishing Davies a speedy recovery. To clear up the slight controversy about the Saints’ fans reaction yes there was an audible cheer when Davies took the initial hit but nobody in the crowd could have envisaged the true nature of Davies’ situation at that point. When they did realise Davies was applauded off the field with the full respect that should be afforded to any player in such dire straits. Sport hurts. Any player crossing the white line is to be admired for their courage.

Grace Getting Better And Better

It was Saints who adapted to the enforced reshuffling the better of the two sides. Not immediately as Percival’s exit was all the encouragement that the Warriors needed to attack down that edge where Louie McCarthy-Scarsbrook had been asked to fill in. Zak Hardaker went over with ease to reduce Wigan’s arrears to 6-4, and that after he’d been knocked backwards into Warrington’s year in trying to stop James Roby’s opening try for Saints. Then came Davies’ injury and the first two of Regan Grace’s hat-trick were in the bag by half-time. First he supported a superb break by Jonny Lomax to go over in the left corner and then he was the beneficiary of some sensational work by Luke Thompson who broke the line, handed on to Lachlan Coote and then was on hand to feed Grace from dummy half as if he’d played hooker all of his life.

Grace’s third was all his own work. It didn’t cover the same distance as his effort against Warrington a week previously but there were eerie parallels as he stepped away from the attentions of his opposing winger and centre before streaking clear and rounding the fullback. Hardaker and Stefan Ratchford are two of the best fullbacks in Super League but the young Welshman has made them both look ordinary in the last two games. He now has 11 tries for the season and even the loss of Percival inside him could not slow his progress. He’s added a real physical strength to the natural speed he has always had. He could become unplayable over the next two or three years.

Coote Form Causes Revisionism on Barba

Coote has been something of a revelation since joining Saints from North Queensland Cowboys in the off-season. He’s been so good that he’s already inspired his own song among the fans, which is not what might have been expected when he was signed. The doubters ummed and aahed and predicted that he would never replace Ben Barba, whose brilliance helped sweep Saints to the League Leaders Shield last year before it all began to unravel for both club and player.

Coote was outstanding again here, racking up 134 metres on 13 carries at 10.30 metres per carry. He had seven tackle busts, made two clean breaks, kicked six goals and wrapped the whole thing up in a big Easter bow by mugging Hardaker for Saints’ last try. He’s a fabulous, fabulous player. If you sense a but...you’d be right.

That doesn’t mean Barba wasn’t. It’s already become common among fans and pundits to suggest that Coote is a better player than Barba. A better signing. More of a team player. Part of that is emotive revisionism sparked by the way that Barca’s time at Saints and seemingly his career has ended. He doesn’t deserve anyone’s sympathy for getting himself in his current predicament but as much as anything else are we trying to convince ourselves that Barba wasn’t all that? Are we on the rebound, insisting that our current lover is The One and that our ex was an absolute thunderprick in any case?

Even if you still remember Barba’s genius it remains unfair to suggest that he wasn’t a team player. He led the league in assists but more than that his role was to find a way to produce the spectacular. To score and create tries that others could not conceive of. That’s what he was bought for and that is what was expected of him. In that sense he was fulfilling his role in the team in the same way Coote does. Grace doesn’t score more tries than Thompson or Roby because he’s selfish, he does so because that’s his job.

We are blessed to have a player like Coote in the side now but let’s not re-write history when it comes to Barba just to soften the blow of how it all turned out.

Holbrook To Stay

Although this was a highly significant and hugely satisfying win it might not be the most important development of the week long term. Wigan are fairly dismal anyway so the truth is we should beat them and beat them handsomely. While we storm away at the top of the table they continue to show relegation form in the wake of their many and varied off-field disasters. Their only chance in this one was only ever going to be the proverbial ‘puncher’s chance’ afforded to out-matched boxers.

The biggest deal of the week might be the moves being made on the future of coach Justin Holbrook. Almost from the moment Saints started winning under Holbrook the Australian has been linked with a return home and a shot at a top job in the NRL. Many suggested Paul Wellens was being groomed to take over sooner rather than later, a move that if nothing else would have shown how little we have learned from the whole Kieron Cunningham trauma. A club legend with no prior experience of head coaching but who has served an apprenticeship under a canny Australian? No, not again. Not yet.

Heartening then that when asked about his future this week Holbrook had this to say;

“I’ve had a quick chat to the Chairman and we want to wait until Easter is out of the way and have a chat in May. I’m happy with that, he’s happy with that and I’m happy here. We’ll see what happens. I haven’t got any plans to leave.”

This sounds extremely promising from a guy who most believed was virtually on the plane back home at the end of this season when his initial contract expires. He’s improved every single player he inherited from Cunningham, brought us the excitement of Barba and has made yet more shrewd signings in Coote, Naiqama and Paulo. All that is missing from his Saints CV is that final step of winning a major final. Cynics might say that his inability to do so as yet might be the only thing stopping NRL clubs from really pushing hard to get him, but that unfinished business might also be a factor in his own thinking about whether to stay or go. We can only hope that he stays to finish the job he is doing so well and if he can then also that he can persuade the likes of Thompson, Walmsley and Makinson to join him in putting on hold any ambitions they may have on the other side of the world.

Who’s on deck for Monday?

No sooner had he stepped in to replace Percival at centre than McCarthy-Scarsbrook was himself forced out of the action through injury. Those two join Theo Fages and Zeb Taia in missing out on Saints’ 19-man squad for the Easter Monday visit of Hull FC. Jack Ashworth, Adam Swift, Joe Batchelor and Jack Welsby all feature as Holbrook tries to deal with the hectic Bank Holiday schedule.

The main issue surrounds the centre position. Matty Costello is out injured so Holbrook may opt for what he did when Percival missed the home win over Hull KR at the end of March and give Welsby the nod. However, Swift’s return to action on dual registration at Leigh recently gives the coach the option of drafting him in and moving Makinson into the centre position. Naiqama can also be used as a winger, while Taia’s second row berth may go to Batchelor. Loaned back to York after failing to establish himself Batchelor would surely relish the opportunity. And what better time than against a Hull FC team that has also had to make a raft of changes following their derby win over Hull KR? None of Josh Griffin, Danny Houghton, Mickey Paea or Gareth Ellis will be backing up from their impressive thrashing of Rovers. Add to that the fact that Saints now have a four-point lead at the top of the table following Warrington’s surprise defeat to Salford and it becomes more tempting to rest stars and improve the experience of the fringe players. Aaron Smith is another fitting that bill after coming off the bench for the last half hour at Wigan. He impressed and it seems to make little sense to make the 33-year-old Roby play for a second time in four days.

It’s perhaps not the message that the club would want to send to the fans as they hope for a big Easter Monday crowd in the first leg of the Steve Prescott Cup, but we might see two much-changed sides going at it in the Round 12 clash. And then the debate about the rights and wrongs of the Easter double header will really kick in.