5 Talking Points From Saints 26 Wakefield Trinity 6

Congratulations!

Though we didn’t know it when the final whistle blew this comfortable win over Chris Chester’s Wakefield side has secured Saints a second consecutive League Leaders Shield. Warrington’s failure to beat Catalans Dragons in Perpignan means that they are still 12 points behind Justin Holbrook’s side with only five games remaining and a possible 10 points to play for in the regular season. It is Saints’ eighth League Leaders Shield since playoffs and the Grand Final were introduced in 1998.

The coach and the players will no doubt emphasise the fact that the main goals for the 2019 season are to win the Challenge Cup and the Grand Final. Nobody in our number wants to see a repeat of last season when Saints were dominant in the regular season but saw the wheels rather fall off in semi-final defeats to Catalans in the cup and Warrington in the race to Old Trafford. Yet at the same time Saints’ consistency in 2019 is something worth celebrating. They have lost only three games all season in the league so far, two of which were away at London with much-changed line-ups. Only the Dragons can reasonably claim to have got on top of Saints’ best available side when they won 18-10 at Perpignan in March.

The London losses are an indication that lessons have been learned from last year. Saints ran out of steam towards the end of the campaign, distracted by the speculation surrounding the future of Ben Barba and hampered by some of his disinterested displays towards the back end of the year. While this year we have had the unwelcome distraction of Holbrook’s announcement that he will be leaving the club at the end of the season the issue has at least been resolved in time for everyone involved to refocus and push on. Holbrook’s unimpeachable professionalism should make that an easier task than it proved a year ago.

Yet whatever happens now this team should be lauded for their consistency. We all want the major trophies the most, but at the same time we also know that winning two playoff games in early autumn doesn’t really make you the best side over the season. It seems likely that the shield will be presented ahead of our next home league game with Castleford on August 30. It is only right and proper that a big home crowd gets to see that presentation but part of me wishes we could do it on Warrington’s patch when the team’s meet there on Thursday. Perhaps we could have it delivered by plane with a banner that reads ‘not your year’. The ugly scenes in the crowd following Warrington’s loss in France tonight are a compelling argument for not antagonising them like that. It probably wouldn’t go down well with their idiot element, who it must be said are a minority. Yet when you fly a plane over your rivals’ ground a week before you visit them you can expect sympathy to be in short supply. The Wolves Are Waiting, it read.

They still are.

Only Saints Can Stop Saints

If you read the social media of fans and rugby league journalists the biggest threat to our ambitions this year is not Warrington but Wigan. Their 15-14 win over Hull FC on Thursday night (August 1) has anyone with half an opinion on the game touting Adrian Lam’s side as one to be feared. Even some Saints fans have bought into it, no doubt scarred by last season’s denouement and, if they are anywhere near my age, by a childhood filled with disappointment in which we constantly deferred to the great Wigan sides of the era.

No more. Squeaking past a Hull FC side capable of losing 55-2 to Huddersfield Giants is a world away from beating Saints in a big playoff game or Grand Final. Wigan have yet to prove that they can beat either of the top two. Their last attempt to beat Saints was preceded by a week of talking the talk before they had their behinds summarily handed to them. A fortunate Zak Hardaker try from a charged down Jonny Lomax kick and a couple of penalty goals was all they could manage against Saints’ swarming defence. Meanwhile Saints ran in 32 points at the other end. Saints’ attack isn’t hitting the heights of earlier in the season but there has been little or no drop-off in defensive intensity. It took Wakefield until a few minutes before the end of this one to register their only try of the night through Kelepi Tanginoa, while Halifax never got within spitting distance of the Saints line during last week’s semi-final.

If there is a weakness for an improving pretender like Wigan to try to exploit it is in Saints’ fluency with the ball. All of the recent changes in personnel have made the attack disjointed at times and it will be interesting to see if that fluency returns when the likes of Lomax, Lachlan Coote, Regan Grace, Alex Walmsley and Morgan Knowles are reintroduced. All of those players missed this game for one reason or another and may take time to really hit their straps when they come back. Form is not something which can be turned on and off like a tap and Holbrook needs to strike the right balance between resting tired bodies and giving them enough repetition to peak at the right time. As things stand, for all the bluster coming from over Billinge Lump and from the Wigan-centric rugby league media, the team most likely to stop Saints is Saints.

Taia Return A Major Boost

Though as we have seen there were several star names not in duty here the return of Zeb Taia was a welcome one. The former Catalans Dragons back rower was in some rich form before a shoulder injury sustained in the win over Leeds in June halted his progress. He wasn’t quite at his brilliant best here, managing 69 metres on 13 carries with just two tackle busts, but his 24 tackles in defence are hopefully evidence that he is completely over what was a nasty-looking injury which at the time we feared may threaten his availability for Wembley and the season run-in.

It should also be remembered that without Grace this was not Saints’ first choice left hand edge. When those two and Mark Percival are back together there isn’t a right edge trio in the whole of Super League who will handle them. Taia is still Saints’ leading off-loader despite his spell on the sidelines and that ability should add an extra dimension to a Saints attack that has not been quite so sharp on second phase play in recent weeks.

Taia is cut from the cloth of the traditional Saints forward, uncompromising and hard-working yet with an ability to do something out of the ordinary with ball in hand. He draws defenders to him which allows more space for the playmakers at fullback and in the halves to wreak their havoc. His languid style and expansive approach together with his age (33) has led some to question his place in the side since he arrived in 2017. Yet he has been instrumental in our success over the last two years and could be one of the keys to making sure we finish the job this time.

Danny Impresses, But Maybe Not Enough

Handed rare starts in recent weeks because of the injury to Coote, Danny Richardson has done little to harm his chances of re-establishing himself in the team. He was a regular in 2018, selected for the Super League Dream Team and the England Knights squad. He had to pull out of the latter through injury and things got worse for him after Holbrook began to prefer Theo Fages in the scrum-half role at Saints. Yet with Lomax unavailable Fages and Richardson were paired again in the halves as they had been - to mixed reviews - in the cup win over Halifax.

Richardson was not alone in starting slowly against Trinity. Saints were in a battle for the first 20 minutes but when they cut loose in that second quarter of the game it was Richardson who starred. He scored one try, dummying smartly to his left before allowing his pace to take him through the Wakefield cover, and made another when his neat grubber was pounced upon by Louie McCarthy-Scarsbrook. He almost created another for Fages in similar fashion but the Frenchman was adjudged to have been offside.

Richardson only really played in patches. Saints were well below par in attack after the break, adding only one further try through Kevin Naiqama. In that context the young half probably hasn’t done quite enough to convince Holbrook that he is the man to turn to at seven when Lomax is back on board and the games get bigger. Yet Richardson certainly reiterated what we already knew, which is that he is a more than viable option if the worst happens and injuries bite.

With the League Leaders Shield wrapped up only the Challenge Cup Final is a high stakes game for Saints between now and the playoffs. That could lead to further opportunities for Richardson to show what he has to offer. With an as yet unidentified new man coming in to replace Holbrook for 2020 and beyond Richardson may yet get the opportunity to prove that his long term future should lie with the club with which he has made his name.

Luke Thompson - Rather Good

Saints most effective forward on the night was undoubtedly Luke Thompson. The young star seemed to be operating on a different plane at times. He would have gained more than 117 metres had Holbrook not taken the decision to sit him down with the game won part way through the second half. Ably assisted by Matty Lees (39 tackles, 10 from marker), Thompson covered the Alex Walmsley-shaped hole in the Saints front row seamlessly. His five tackle busts, one clean break and one offload made him a constant threat in attack, while in defence he offered 34 tackles, again a figure that would have been even more impressive but for his early withdrawal. The one area of concern was the six tackle attempts that he missed, though it seems that the entire team’s philosophy on defence is that missing tackles is not in itself a problem provided you don’t allow your opponent to ground the ball over the try-line.

Longer term the biggest problem we have with Thompson is holding on to him. He:s no doubt enjoying starring for his boyhood club and I’m sure he’s as desperate as any of us to win at Wembley and Old Trafford. But the speculation around a move to the NRL began some time ago, with England coach Wayne Bennett engaging in some flattering but unwanted gum-flapping on the subject. We have seen the success that English players have had over in Australia in recent years. Where once Adrian Morley was the only Englishman regularly appearing in the NRL he has been followed by the Burgess brothers, Gareth Ellis, James Graham, Josh Hodgson, Elliott Whitehead and John Bateman. George Williams and Kallum Watkins are the latest to try their luck on the other side of the world.

Thompson seems to have everything he needs to make it in the toughest league in the world and it is very difficult for any Super League club to stop the player drain. It’s not just a matter of money but also of the standard of play, of lifestyle and of whether or not the player wants to experience a new culture. And why wouldn’t you want to get out of here with Bonkers Boris and his cronies intent on driving us over the cliff’s edge? Like Richardson, Thompson may be persuaded that a new coach offers enough of a new challenge. Yet a consequence of success is that bigger fish start swimming around your best, young talent. We might want to enjoy Thompson while we still can.