Saints 19 Salford Red Devils 12 - Super League Semi-Final Review

As expected it was tight, but Saints eventually broke Salford Red Devils’ resolve to make it through to a record-extending 14th Super League Grand Final appearance with this 19-12 win on Saturday (September 17).

It means that the champions will get the chance to win an unprecedented fourth Super League title in a row. Standing in their way at Old Trafford next week will be Leeds Rhinos - themselves veterans of 10 previous Grand Finals. They also happen to be the only other side to have won three back-to-back Grand Finals since the inception of the event in 1998. Saints coach Kristian Woolf has a chance to become the only head coach to win three in a row having led the club to victory in 2020 and 2021. Leeds’ three successes between 2007-09 came under two different coaches in Tony Smith and Brian McClennan.


For Salford it is the end of the road. Yet they can be hugely proud of their efforts. Just like their 2019 vintage they have defied the expectations of the outsiders and maybe even their own. Just like three years ago they have fallen short against Saints. After a fairly dismal start to 2022 which saw them win just three of their first 11 matches the Red Devils have been transformed by coach Paul Rowley in the second half of the season. 


Whether the competition structure should enable a side starting so slowly to make it this far and potentially all the way to the title is a debate we will continue to have annually in September and October.  The argument will intensify in this little corner of the world should the Rhinos win in Manchester. But coming into this one there were few who would have disagreed with the notion that Salford were the form team in the top flight. My pre-game nerves and those of much of the Saints fan base were genuine and justified. 


A lot of those nerves stemmed from the continued struggle with injuries. The squad announcement on Thursday (September 15) did little to quell the anxiety. Treatment room staple Will Hopoate was not included, joining Alex Walmsley and long term absentees Lewis Dodd and Regan Grace on the sidelines. On the plus side Mark Percival and Sione Mata’utia returned. Come game day they formed an all new left edge in the three-quarters with Percival on the wing and Mata’utia at centre. Jon Bennison occupied the fullback role allowing Jack Welsby to join Jonny Lomax in the halves. Agnatius Passi started at prop for Walmsley.


Rowley’s side were closer to full strength but had to do without their most influential player. Arguably the most influential player in the league in 2022. Brodie Croft has been reviving his career with some outstanding performances in Super League this year after his rise to NRL stardom somehow hit the buffers. So much so that he is the newly crowned Steve Prescott Man Of Steel. Unfortunately for the Red Devils his brief loss of consciousness in last week’s playoff win at Huddersfield Giants cost him his place in this one due to concussion protocols.  Chris Atkin stepped into the halves alongside Marc Sneyd.


Less than two minutes in Salford lost another key piece of their puzzle. Andy Ackers is many people’s choice as England hooker for the forthcoming World Cup. There is logic in that with James Roby not budging from international retirement, Josh Hodgson injured and Micky McIlorum being…well…Micky McIlorum. Ackers’ exit from the action was swift as he got his head in entirely the wrong place in attempting to tackle Bennison. Ackers was sent for an HIA from which he was not able to return. Bennison was perhaps fortunate not to suffer similarly given the reckless nature of Elijah Taylor’s part in the incident. He charged in at Bennison foregoing any thought to using his arms to wrap up the Saints fullback. Referee Chris Kendall chose not to even penalise Taylor for his effort which - while not conclusively high - was completed with the shoulder for the most part. The rules and interpretations change often but I’m amost certain that shoulder charges are still illegal.


Saints dominated early in both territory and possession. Yet there were signs from pretty early on that their functional, frills-free attack wasn’t going to find it easy to smash down the Salford doors. Morgan Knowles came up with a fairly basic error 10 metres out from Welsby’s pass before Mata’utia suffered a similar fate albeit with the Red Devils defence in somewhat closer proximity as he attempted to shift the ball on to Percival.. 


It wasn’t until Woolf’s side got to the last play and their short kicking game that they carved out a genuine scoring chance. Lomax was the architect, sending a low kick through the defensive line and into the in-goal area for the chasers on the right edge to run on to.  First to it was Joe Batchelor, but when Kendall sent it up for review with an initial decision of no try the ruling was confirmed. The ball had just beaten Batchelor who could only catch up with it in time to ground it on the dead ball line. On the line is out. 


Events later in the contest would spark a debate about whether Batchelor’s efforts should have been rewarded with a penalty try. There was no discussion between Kendall and video referee James Child about a penalty try even though replays showed that Sneyd had pulled Batchelor’s arm back as he gave chase. Given how close the ex-York man got to grounding the ball there were many Saints fans making the case that he would have got to the ball well in time without the intervention of Sneyd. 


And he might. But could Child have been certain if it had been referred to him? Probably not to my mind. Batchelor did extremely well to get to it when he did. Without the benefit of hindsight I’m not sure you’d expect Batchelor to catch up with it at the time of the foul. The question is whether Child would have been able - in accordance with the law - to rule on it based on what I would suggest turned out to be an unlikely outcome. There should be a high bar for the awarding of a penalty try and this - along with the now notorious foul by Tommy Makinson on Tim Lafai which we will deal with later - is not it. It doesn’t help that most observers of a red vee persuasion have only raised it in response to the howls of derision from Red Devils fans over the Lafai incident. Then it just looks like whataboutery.


Happily, Batchelor didn’t have to wait long for a more favourable outcome. The methodology was pretty similar to the earlier near miss. Lomax again asked the question with a testing short kick which Batchelor was again first to respond to. It needed the approval of Child in the booth - and for whatever reason he took three or four looks at it - but Saints were up and running. Makinson landed his first goal of the day and Saints had a 6-0 lead which their dominance justified.  


They could have added to that lead a couple of minutes later. Again Lomax was at the centre of it, finding Hurrell in space down the right. The ex-Leeds man handed it on to Makinson who looked certain to get away and either score himself or send a return pass to Hurrell who had continued his run. Yet the Saints winger was denied by a desperate ankle tap by Joe Burgess. It wasn’t quite of the magnitude of Josh Dugan on Kallum Watkins in the 2017 World Cup final but it was a try saver which at that stage arguably kept Rowley’s side in the game. Not many teams recover from double digit deficits at the home of the Saints. And so it was to prove the case again here. For now it was a vital interjection by the former Wigan flyer. 


Yet not for very long. Only a couple of minutes later Lomax - turning in a stellar performance during which it seemed he was expected to do everything in this house as far as creativity in attack was concerned - provided Batchelor with his second. It seems strange to reflect that if a different referee (or the video referee had he been asked) had taken a different view of the earlier near miss then Batchelor could have had a hat-trick in the opening quarter of the game. 


He was able to take Lomax’s pass and spin over for his second try. His 12th of the season in all competitions and his first double in Saints colours. It extended the run of games in which the 27 year-old has crossed the whitewash to three having done so in defeat at Wigan as well as in the home win over Toulouse which rounded off the regular season. The extra two was a tough ask for Makinson from a wide position but he didn’t blink and Saints led 12-0. 


For all their dominance in that first 20 minutes Saints were still too reliant on Lomax, in particular his short kicking game. Perhaps that is understandable with only Lomax and Makinson playing in their correct positions in what would be considered Saints’ strongest back division if everyone was available. Yet it has also become part of their DNA under Woolf. Physically dominate through the forwards and then if the opposition stand up to it until late in the count look for Lomax - or sometimes Welsby - to create something at the back end of the set. Saints are literally grinding teams down at the moment. Some may be happy with it as long as the team wins. Others may feel it necessary in order to make sure that they do win. I don’t think anyone could argue that it’s nice to watch. If Woolf’s successor fails to emulate his results - and given Woolf’s incredible record there is a fair chance of a dip - I will miss the trophies and the glory. I won’t miss the tactics.


If Woolf had anything to do with the next major incident in the game then he can take that with him when he goes too. Having tackled Atkin Knowles’ inexplicably decided to grab hold of the Salford man’s arms as the pair tried to disentangle themselves from each other. The Saints man then proceeded to push Atkin’s arm up his back in the manner of Gripper Stebson trying to steal Roland Browning’s lunch money in Grange Hill. Perhaps I’m showing my age there. 


Either way it was inexplicable, inexcusable grubbery from Knowles. If his Wigan namesake Mr Smithies had done something like that we’d be calling for him to serve a significant stretch at His Majesty’s Pleasure. Woolf opined that he would be ‘flabbergasted’ if Knowles were to be banned for the incident. His gast was well and truly flabbered when the Match Review Panel handed out a two-game suspension.


That means that Knowles will now miss the Grand Final following an unsuccessful appeal which defined the disciplinary’s new buzzword ‘frivolous’. That’s a shame but to my mind Knowles only has himself to blame. What are you trying to achieve by pushing someone’s arm up their back other than to cause some damage? Or steal their lunch money. And as far as the decision to appeal is concerned is this really who we are? Can we not leave the shithousing and villainy to the other lot down the road who specialise in it? In supporting the innocence or diminishing the culpability of Knowles we are swiping the moral high ground from beneath our own feet. Frankly this is no way for the leading club in Super League to behave. 


Kendall wasn’t too enamoured with Knowles’ and promptly sent him to the sin-bin. It was the ex-Wales international’s third yellow card of the season. It also opened up a door for the Red Devils who gratefully passed through it in the very next set. Sneyd and Atkin shifted the ball right to Watkins before the former Rhino - a veteran of three Grand Final success and trying to get to a fourth - stepped out of the tackle of Welsby and had too much strength for Bennison as he dived over to put the visitors on the scoreboard. Sneyd’s conversion reduced the arrears to one converted try at 12-6.


The short kick to Batchelor’s side of the field was still proving profitable for Saints. If something is working then most would suggest you keep doing it. This time it was Welsby with the dab beyond the Salford try line where Batchelor just failed to ground the ball. Kendall was confident enough in his own judgement not to send it up for review and got it just about spot on. Batchelor did get a hand to the ball but bounced it on the ground rather than applying any downward pressure. A try then could have broken Salford’s resolve. They were hanging on by a combination of their own defensive desire and Saints’ lack of a cutting edge in attack.


And so to the other big disciplinary issue which has had rugby league fans - friend or foe - wagging their tongues in the aftermath of this clash. Sneyd flipped a ball to Atkin that might as well have had a big red cross painted on it like the flag of St George or the doors of the infected in plague-era London. It set Atkin up to be met with a juddering, bone-shaking, spirit-jarring bell ringer of a hit from Welsby. As big hits go it could not have been better timed. Welsby arrived at precisely the moment Atkin took possession of the ball which left the coast clear for him to tee off on the former Hull KR man. Atkin’s only aim was to avoid losing possession which to his credit he managed to do. 


Since the hit those of a non-Saints persuasion have been calling for Welsby to be suspended and so sit out the Grand Final along with Knowles. There seems to be a fair amount of outrage at the fact that the Match Review Panel did not agree. They did charge Welsby - probably due to the fact that there was contact between his shoulder and Atkin’s head as the Saints star wrapped his arms around in a front on position. But if there is such a thing as incidental contact then this was it.  


Apparently it was Welsby’s excellent disciplinary record - and not the fact that he made a very good tackle with some unfortunate accidental contact - which spared him from a suspension. He was found guilty of a Grade A offence but given no ban. All of which smells like a cop out from a body who didn’t want to ban a star player from a showpiece event if they can help it but didn’t want to be seen to be veering too far from their previous strict liability policy. It’s a compromise. Welsby avoids the ban he doesn’t really deserve but the MRP get to highlight the fact that they did notice the head contact and made a token gesture towards sanctioning it.  If he does it again he’ll get banned. And there’ll be outrage from people who either don’t understand or can’t accept the disciplinary process.


Though Salford had got back into it through Watkins’ try they continued to struggle in the face of some monstrous defence from Saints. There were plenty of times when Sneyd found himself kicking from in and around his own 20 metre line as the Red Devils continually struggled to make good metres. When they did get out the AJ Bell Stadium side fluffed their lines. Watkins broke the shackles briefly but his pass to a temporarily unguarded Ken Sio squirmed from the grasp of the league’s second top scorer and into touch. Rowley’s men were making few chances and spurning those that they had. A combination which - as a blueprint for beating the top side in the competition - had a demonstrable lack of potential. 


Saints were not exactly firing either. When Taylor foolishly stripped the ball from Hurrell’s grasp to concede a kickable penalty the champions opted to go for goal. An eight-point cushion at 14-6 seemed like a pretty handy advantage in what had hitherto been a clash not exactly over-flowing with try scoring opportunities. Makinson stepped up from 45 metres out but could not connect. The winger has kicked 71 of his 105 attempts at goal this season. That’s more successes than all but three others in Super League but more misses than anyone else in the competition. Much like Saints high error count - a league leading 306 - Makinson’s record is a consequence of having the goal-kicking responsibility for a team which regularly dominates opponents.


Errors further thwarted Saints as they looked for the score that would push them out of immediate striking distance. Roby was having a highly uncharacteristic struggle to hold on to the ball and distribute it with his usual faultless accuracy. Mata’utia was battling with the demands on his skill set which come from switching to the centres. So again it was left to Lomax to conjure up another opportunity - one which ultimately proved hugely influential mentally if not practically. 


His kick to the in-goal was taken dead by Burgess inside the final minute of the first half. From the resultant dropout Roby moved into his natural habitat of dummy half and was on target with the pass to Lomax this time. Setting himself 30 metres out the Saints half struck his drop-goal attempt well, arrowing it between the posts as time ran out.  Crucially, Salford were now 13-6 down and saddled with the psychological annoyance of knowing they needed to score twice to get back on terms or take the lead.   


If Lomax was the chief string-yanker for Saints then Sneyd filled the vacancy for Salford. Early in the second half his incredible 40/20 attempt fell just inches short of setting the Red Devils up with what probably would have been their best attacking position since Watkins’ try. It also served as a reminder that the Red Devils remained a threat as long as they had Sneyd to guide them around, especially in the absence of Croft. 


Still it was the hosts who would go closest to the first points of the second half. Welsby caused mayhem in the Salford defence before finding Sironen, whose offload found Lees charging towards the line. The recently capped England prop was held up short and could not resist stretching out an arm to promote the ball over the line. Kendall was wise to it and correctly whistled for a double movement. In so doing he denied Lees a try in consecutive games. The Saints prop had previously made 22 appearances without one prior to breaking his 2022 duck in the home win over Toulouse. 


Welsby was next to try his luck, kicking ahead midway inside the Salford half before seeing the ball narrowly beat his chase to the dead ball line. Perhaps Saints were losing a bit of patience in attack, evidenced further by the one genuine boil on the backside of Lomax’s otherwise exemplary performance. And a costly boil at that. Trying to put boot to ball on another attacking kick Lomax instead took a rather clumsy looking air shot which fell kindly for Salford to recover. 


Quickly, they shifted it left through King Vuniyayawa, Sneyd and Lafai to release Burgess down the left hand touchline. He had too much pace for anyone up in the Saints defensive line and when Bennison got across to cover there was Brierley on the inside to finish off a flowing move. He even had time to run around underneath the posts to make Sneyd’s conversion a formality. Suddenly that Lomax drop-goal was the only difference between the sides at 13-12,  


Five minutes after Brierley’s try the Salford faithful almost saw their side go in front. Vuniyayawa just delayed his pass to Sneyd too long which meant that the Fijian was unable to avoid running around the back of Deon Cross. Sneyd had moved the ball on to Taylor who strolled over but the try was chalked off by Kendall. Correctly, as it turns out under the current interpretations. Kendall has had far, far more criticism from fans than his performance deserves - particularly on social media. But then what else is new? The game’s gone, after all. And it if you ask the average, in-no-way-biased rugby league fan the principal reason for its departure from wherever it is supposed to be is Kendall. Or Child. Or Robert Hicks. Or Ben Thaler. Take your pick. 


Saints - champion side that they are - responded to this minor heart stop by marching down the other end of the field and scoring what was perhaps the game clincher. Lomax’s trusty, overworked boot found another probing effort into the Salford in-goal. This time it was not Batchelor but Bennison who steamed on to it despite having started his run several metres behind his veteran team-mate. The speed of Bennison’s chase must have caught out Sneyd and Lafai too. The pair appeared statuesque as the Saints stand-in fullback won the race to touch down with something to spare. It was his sixth try in his 17 appearances in the first team. And the most important by some considerable distance. Makinson was on target with the extras and with just 10 minutes to play there was breathing space again.


Saints could have sealed it had Hurrell and Makinson managed to be tuned into the same station when an opportunity arose. The Tongan centre found a bit of space out wide but his flicked pass out to Makinson on the wing only found touch.  An error count of 13 is not huge for a team which has made more handling mistakes than any other in 2022 but it was higher than even their own average of 11.33 per game. It also goes some way to explaining why Saints relied so much on the boot of Lomax to create opportunities. It just wasn’t a day on which things clicked in the back division even on the relatively few occasions that it chanced its arm. That has plenty to do with the constant shuffling of personnel from 1 to 7 but in the case of Hurrell and Makinson they have spent almost the entire season in tandem on Saints’ right. This wasn’t the highlight of what has been a pretty fruitful link-up.


Salford’s big ‘if only’ moment arrived late. Sneyd managed to get another searching kick to stand up near the sideline just a few metres from Saints try line. Bennison was forced to take the ball out over the touchline to give Salford a try scoring chance with six minutes on the clock. They nearly took it. If you were to ask anyone of a Salford persuasion they would no doubt argue that they did. Sneyd was behind it all once more as his kick rolled into the Saints in-goal area. As Lafai began to chase it Makinson took the cynical decision to stop him in his tracks, grabbing hold of the Salford centre and pulling him back. 


Kendall swiftly produced the yellow card for Makinson’s professional foul. Yet crucially, the referee chose not to award a penalty try nor even to hand it upstairs for further analysis. As much as this may not carry too much weight coming from a column dedicated to all things Saints I think he probably made the right call. The fact that fans and observers of all persuasions have been arguing about it since shows there is doubt about whether Lafai would have got to the ball. 


The yellow card is right because it denied Lafai an opportunity to score.  For a penalty try to be awarded the foul must deny a certainty in the opinion of the referee. Even if it had been handed upstairs and the video referee had felt differently than either Kendall or I, it seems unlikely that he would have considered that there was sufficient evidence to overturn. It’s a hard luck story for Salford and I get their frustration. And that of the rest of the league who are probably bored shitless with the concept of Saints in Grand Finals. But - as with the earlier call involving Sneyd on Batchelor - the right decision was probably made according to the laws. 


The argument that Makinson would not have made the foul had Lafai not been about to score holds no water. Or to go all Joe Lycett on the matter it doth butter no parsnips. Makinson made the foul to eliminate the possibility of Lafai getting to it. Not because he was certain that he would. He made a split second decision not to leave it to chance. And he got what is the current sanction for it in a yellow card.  No more to see.


Right or wrong it was an outcome which finally put Salford away. There was still time for Sio’s season to end in La La Land as he caught an accidental knee to the head from Lees. And for some more tiresome histrionics from Louie McCarthy-Scarsbrook as he Smithies-ed all around the unfortunate Vuniyayawa when he was deemed to have made an error at the play-the-ball. It looked like less than legal pressure from the Saints prop from the two places I was sat. Inside the ground at the time and then again on my sofa the next day. The last desperate throw of the dice came when Sneyd’s crossfield kick deep inside his own territory found Burgess but his pass inside was knocked down by Lomax to end the game.


The best team won this game, despite Salford’s hard luck stories and some truly mind-numbing attack from Saints. Woolf’s side had far more possession and territory and were more dominant defensively than a seven-point winning margin suggests. With the added creativity of a Lewis Dodd they could have scored more points. But no doubt Salford fans will see our Lewis Dodd and raise us a Croft. Yet even he would have struggled to create during the first quarter of the game when the Red Devils could barely get out of their own 20m zone. 


The stats illustrate Saints’ superiority. No fewer than eight Saints made 100+ metres. Leading the way with 170 was Bennison. Hurrell was a constant threat so long as he avoided trying to pass as he added 147. You’d expect nothing more than Makinson to be on the list with 132. Coming in on the unfamiliar position of left wing and knocking out 126 metres represents a decent return to action for Percival after a four-month layoff.   In the forwards Sironen was the most impactful going forward with 136 metres followed by Paasi on 107, Knowles on 105 and Lees on 100. 


For all that they fell short in this one Salford can be hugely proud of their 2022 efforts, particularly in the second half of the season. I have my own views on the question of whether a team which loses eight of its first 11 games should ever end up one game from a Grand Final. Yet the improvement in Rowley’s side throughout the second half of the year has been awesome. Their performances have been dazzling, giving the entire game a much needed shot in the arm after a seemingly interminable period of grinding, arm-wrestling and the bloody processes. If Rowley can keep this team together and keep improving it they’ll be a threat in 2023. But can he? Other clubs will have noticed the quality they have in their ranks? That’s always been Salford’s problem. See 2019.


For Saints it’s that 14th Grand Final, and a fifth against Leeds Rhinos. You won’t need me to remind you that the trophy has gone to Headingley on the other four occasions. But the last of those was 11 years ago. Makinson, Lomax, Roby and McCarthy-Scarsbrook are the only current Saints bearing those scars.  Only Zak Hardaker featured for Leeds. 


The history means nothing this week. Does it?


Saints; Bennison, Makinson, Hurrell, Mata’utia, Percival, Welsby, Lomax, Paasi, Roby, Lees, Sironen, Batchelor, Knowles. Interchanges: McCarthy-Scarsbrook, Lussick, Bell, Wingfield


Salford Red Devils;


Brierley, Sio, Cross, Lafai, Burgess, Atkin, Sneyd, Vuniyayawa, Ackers, Ormondroyd, Wright, Watkins, Taylor. Interchanges: Dupree, Gerrard, Bourouh, Luckley


Referee: Chris Kendall





 







 


Super League Semi-Final Preview - Saints v Salford Red Devils

Anyone feeling nervous? 


I am.  In the words of that great philosopher Marshall Mathers my palms are sweaty, knees weak, arms are heavy. There’s vomit on my sweater already, mum’s spaghetti.


The cause of this sudden neurosis is of course the Super League semi-final between our threepeating, injury-ravaged Saints and the suddenly brilliant Salford Red Devils.  The two meet this Saturday afternoon (September 17, kick-off 1.00pm) for a place in the Old Trafford Grand Final a week later. 


There was a time when meeting Salford in a major semi-final would be cause for much joviality.  Victory would be a formality and the chat would mostly be about how you were getting to the final and where you were going for a pint before kick-off.  Not so much this year.  After a late run which saw them win eight out of their final nine Super League regular season games Paul Rowley’s team are suddenly a very different proposition.  Awkwardly, one of those wins was a 44-12 flogging of Kristian Woolf’s side on July 31. And these are wins that have been achieved in a style that can be classed as flambouyant amid the current dominance of conservative, go-through-the-processes rugby league.


Saints had key players missing that day in July but the thing is, they will again this weekend.  The talk of the town in the week leading up to today’s squad announcement (September 15) has been all about who won’t be among Woolf’s 21-man party rather than who will.  


Alex Walmsley was ruled out a couple of days ago with a foot injury which has prevented him from playing since the 30-10 defeat at Wigan on August 26.  That was a pretty savage setback.  Talk among the fans of how Agnatius Paasi or even Matty Lees have out-performed Walmsley this year is evidence of how the ex-Batley man is a victim of his own success. Though he may not be at the level he has been over the last two seasons Walmsley is still our best front rower by some distance.


Yet I felt even greater concern about the fitness or otherwise of Will Hopoate. The rarely seen fullback has only played 11 times in his debut season with Saints.  When he has played he has been crucial.  He slots in at fullback which allows Jack Welsby to move into the halves to fill the Lewis Dodd-sized hole alongside Jonny Lomax that has been there ever since Dodd suffered a season ending Achilles injury in the home win over Wigan on Good Friday.  That was April 15. 


Cutting to the chase, Hopoate has not made it.  While this is about as surprising as the fact that my knees are weak it is also a serious problem.  What does Woolf do?  Does he leave Welsby in the fullback role that he was supposed to occupy after Lachlan Coote left for Hull KR and before Dodd suffered his injury?  If he does then who plays in the halves with Lomax? Woolf has tried Ben Davies on five previous occasions to varying degrees of lead balloonery.  


The coach has also tried moving James Roby there from the hooking role.  The captain may still be one of the best players in Super League or even the world of rugby league but the uncomfortable truth is that he ain’t no halfback.  He hasn’t really been a halfback since around 2005. 


All of which means it will probably fall on Welsby to play there again.  Fullback duties could be handed on to Jon Bennison as he continues his impressive breakout year.  The 19 year-old has made 16 appearances in 2022, far more than perhaps even he would have expected at the start of the year.  Back then the likes of Walmsley and Dodd were available and nobody could foresee the unreliability of Hopoate or the absolute ruin of a season that was about to be endured by Regan Grace. 


Yet even the deployment of Bennison as the last line of defence won’t solve all of our issues.  Who is going to play on the left wing with Grace now concentrating on getting fit enough to embark on his rugby union career in France?  The most commonly suggested solution appears to be to switch the returning Mark Percival out wider to the wing from his favoured left centre position.  Wherever you play Percival it should be remembered that he has not featured in the first team since the 12-10 win at Super League’s touring comedy act Warrington Wolves in the middle of May.  


Bringing the England international centre straight into a semi-final represents a sizeable risk but with the lack of pace in the backs that has been so sorely evident in recent weeks I don’t really see what alternative Woolf has.  If Percival is fit he has to play - even if it is just to plant the seed of the threat of pace in Salford minds.  That said, maybe his body has more chance of holding up on the wing than it would in the centres.  Yet even that depends on how often he is used as a battering ram to get Saints out of their own end.  That is, after all, one of the core principles of Woolfball. It is still a surprise to me that Tommy Makinson’s face doesn’t look more like Paul Sculthorpe’s.


Should Percival be used as a winger – a role he actually occupied in his last two appearances before getting injured – then the smart money is on another returnee – Sione Mata’utia – to fill the centre berth ahead of Davies.  Mata’utia is a second row forward, a fact which is abundantly clear whenever he fills in at centre.  Yet don’t expect that to be a barrier to his selection in the position.  Woolf just does not have a winger available in this 21 other than Makinson. And as the more shrewd among you will have spotted, you need two in your starting 13. 


Josh Simm is not in the squad, nor is Ben Lane who played in the last two regular season games – a defeat to Wakefield alongside several of his fellow academy class – and a win over Toulouse in which the youngster was accompanied by a lot more experience and quality.  Bennison can play on the wing but as we have already established, he will probably have to play fullback.  It is difficult, isn’t it? Imagine how Woolf feels ahead of his final home game as Saints boss. Picking a right edge combination is not so troublesome with Makinson joined by his regular partner on that side Konrad Hurrell.


Despite the loss of Walmsley things look a little more straightforward in the pack.  Paasi should step up from his regular bench spot to start alongside Lees, with Roby at hooker.  If Mata’utia moves to the centres then expect Curtis Sironen and Joe Batchelor to form the second row pairing with Morgan Knowles at loose forward. 


Louie McCarthy-Scarsbrook has another one-year deal in his back pocket.  It is possibly the most undeserved one-year stretch since Deirdrie Rachid was sent to prison in 1998.  Yet the former London Bronco remains welded to the bench along with ex-Salford Red Devils Grand Finalist Joey Lussick.  There are a clutch of candidates to join them.  Standing out among them James Bell has featured in the last eight games while Jake Wingfield has been involved in the last 12.  


That surely makes them more likely to get the nod from Woolf than either Taylor Pemberton or Sam Royle.  Davies’ involvement would appear to rest on whether Woolf would prefer to use him – a natural centre – ahead of Mata’utia in the three-quarters and switch the former Newcastle Knight back into the forwards.   


Our visitors arrive in palm-sweating, knee-weakening, vom-inducing form.  Following that run of eight wins out of nine during the regular season run-in Paul Rowley’s side dismissed Huddersfield Giants 28-0 in their own back yard in their playoff opener last week.  Former Red Devils coach Ian Watson and his troops had no answers to the flair on offer from the likes of Brodie Croft, Tim Lafai, Deon Cross and Kallum Watkins.  With Marc Sneyd pulling the strings in the kicking game and Andy Ackers an eye-catching presence at hooker Rowley’s men had all the tools they need to trouble any Super League side. 


And then Croft got injured.  


The former Melbourne Storm and Brisbane Broncos man left the action at the John Smith’s Stadium just before half-time having briefly lost consciousness.  Concussion protocols now dictate that a player who has been knocked out or failed an HIA must sit out of action for a period of 11 days.  So this game comes around just too quickly for Croft whose Steve Prescott Man Of Steel nominee form has been a huge driver in Salford’s own upturn in fortunes during the second half of the season. He is a breathtakingly good player who would walk into any Super League side.

 

Yet he is not the only reason for Salford’s rapid rise into major contention.  Structurally I don’t expect too much to change.  Chris Atkin is likely to come in for Croft and although he isn’t on the level of his inspirational team-mate he is a more than capable player.  When Sneyd was out during Salford’s last visit to Saints in April Atkin formed a formidable partnership with Croft.  The former Hull KR man could have won it at the end but was denied his moment of glory by a scarcely believable but quite heroic last ditch tackle by Knowles on the North Stand touchline.  You get the feeling Saints will need that kind of commitment to get through this one.


Rowley will be without Greg Burke and James Greenwood, while there is no Danny Addy either.  Ex-Wigan trio Jack Wells, Dan Sarginson and Morgan Escare all miss out too as well as former Saint Matty Costello.  But in Ryan Brierley, Sio, Cross, Lafai, Burgess, Atkin and Sneyd there is still plenty for Saints to think about in the back division.  


Up front Ackers is a leader by example with no small amount of skill.  His try against the Giants in which he dummied the last defender out of West Yorkshire was an example of everything that is good about Salford. They can mix it too, with Jack Ormondroyd in the form of his life at prop.  He has bobbed around the Championship since his 2018 release by Leeds Rhinos but this year has made 23 appearances in Super League for the Red Devils, scoring five tries.  Former NRL pair Elijah Taylor and Shane Wright can be found in the back row giving the side both skill and solidity.

 

Now you may have seen or heard it mentioned this week that Salford have not won in the town of St Helens since 1980.  That’s 42 years ago.  That was the year when the Empire Struck Back, Dolly Parton, Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda mistakenly believed they had poisoned boss Dabney Coleman and Kramer took on er…Kramer in the courtroom.  On January 12 that year Salford won 18-17 at Knowsley Road with Clive Griffiths, Roy Matthias and Eric Chisnall crossing for Saints’ three-point tries.  Griffiths kicked four goals and Roy Haggerty was on the bench.  It has been a long time since the Saints match day squad contained two men in it called Roy. That is just how long it is since Salford won in St Helens.


Since then Saints have dominated at home against Salford. That Knowles-preserved 14-10 win in April was just the latest in a long line of successes.  It has sometimes been ugly for the visitors.  The first match with fans in attendance post-Covid ended 28-0 in Saints’ favour in May 2021.  Going back to May 2001 Saints scored 11 tries and Sean Long kicked 11 goals - the most he managed in a single game in his stellar 331-game, 2625-point Saints career - as Saints demolished Salford 66-16. In 2018 I witnessed a 34-2 home success from the South West side of the ground after the lift in the North Stand simply refused to operate.  Even machinery couldn’t summon up enthusiasm for a visit from Salford at times during the last four decades. This current Salford crop is a special exception.

 

Semi-finals between the two have sometimes been close. Not particularly the 1997 Challenge Cup semi-final which Saints won 50-20 at Wigan’s old Central Park ground. More the 1977 Floodlit Trophy clash which Saints won 7-4, or the Lancashire Cup last four tie in 1932 which ended 2-2 before Saints won the replay 17-10. The teams have only ever met in one major final, that being Saints’ 23-6 victory in 2019 which started the current run of three Super League titles in a row. 


Will it be four? Or will Salford deny the champions the opportunity to contest a fourth successive Grand Final? It could have been five if Ben Barba hadn’t made a business decision to stop tackling at the end of his highlight-stacked 2018 campaign. It could have been six if Ryan Morgan hadn’t given a daft penalty away in the dying moments at Castleford in 2017. It could have been seven if…no. I can’t make a case for winning the 2016 title. We had Jack Owens on the wing, Dominique Peyroux at centre and Jordan Turner at 6. Greg Richards was a starting prop. Atelea Vea lurked ominously on the bench, and sometimes even started. 


Regardless of injuries this Saints team still has the quality to make it through. They can worry about how to win at Old Trafford if and when they get there. In knockout football you only get one shot.


They must not miss their chance to blow.


Squads;


Saints: 


1. Jack Welsby, 2. Tommy Makinson, 4. Mark Percival, 6. Jonny Lomax, 9. James Roby, 10. Matty Lees, 11. Sione Mata’utia, 12. Joe Batchelor, 13. Morgan Knowles, 14. Joey Lussick, 15. LMS, 16. Curtis Sironen, 17. Agnatius Paasi, 19. Jake Wingfield, 20. James Bell, 22. Ben Davies, 23. Konrad Hurrell, 26. Sam Royle, 27. Jon Bennison, 31. Taylor Pemberton.


Salford Red Devils; 


1. Ryan Brierley 2. Ken Sio 3. Kallum Watkins 4. Tim Lafai 5. Joe Burgess 7. Marc Sneyd 8. Sitaleki Akauola 9. Andy Ackers 11. Shane Wright 13. Elijah Taylor 15. King Vuniyayawa 16. Ryan Lannon 17. Harvey Livett 18. Chris Atkin 19. Jack Ormondroyd 22. Rhys Williams 26. Sam Luckley 27. Amir Bourough 28. Deon Cross 29. Alex Gerrard 32. Tyler Dupree


Referee: Chris Kendall


Saints 36 Toulouse Olympique 16 - Review

It was nervy for a short while - as nervy as a dead rubber can be - but Saints celebrated winning their 10th League Leaders Shield with a 36-16 victory over relegated Toulouse.

The French side’s return to the Championship had been confirmed by their home loss to Catalans Dragons nine days previously. Meanwhile Saints came into this one already assured of top spot after Wigan’s defeat at Hull KR rendered the champions’ own home loss to Wakefield on August 29 virtually meaningless. All it did mean is that Saints needed victory here to avoid a run of three straight Super League defeats for what would have been the first time since September 2017. 


The build-up was inevitably dominated by the news - three days prior to the game - that head coach Kristian Woolf will leave the club at the end of the season. How to focus on a dead rubber when contemplating how to replace a man who has delivered back-to-back titles, a Challenge Cup and now a League Leaders Shield? Yet Woolf has unfinished business before he goes to the NRL’s newest franchise - Redcliffe Dolphins - as an assistant to Wayne Bennett with the promise of taking over when the old GOAT calls it quits. The visit of Sylvain Houles’ side would not unduly influence Woolf’s quest for a third straight Grand Final win. But it could serve as a useful first step on the road from here on in.


With that in mind the big guns came back.  Konrad Hurrell, Jonny Lomax, Jack Welsby, Matty Lees, Curtis Sironen, Joe Batchelor and Morgan Knowles all missed the loss to Wakefield but were drafted back in here. James Roby made the 17 but was only available from the bench. Dan Norman, Louie McCarthy-Scarsbrook and James Bell kept him company. All of that trio had started against Trinity.


Ben Lane - who was one of four debutants against Willie Poching’s side - kept his place on the wing with Josh Simm another on the injured list. Lane’s inclusion as part of a strong Saints side with a realistic expectation of winning is something I can get behind. Yes this was a Saints team still missing Will Hopoate, Mark Percival, Lewis Dodd, Alex Walmsley and Sione Mata’utia as well as the soon to be departed Regan Grace. But I feel sure Lane would have benefitted more from fitting in alongside the returning star names than he had alongside a clutch of his fellow academy graduates last week.  


In the end it was the injection of the skipper midway through the second half which turned the game decisively in Saints favour. The contest had started at the kind of sedate pace that you might expect from an encounter with so little riding on it. Whatever the result Saints would be picking up the League Leaders Shield at the end while Toulouse thoughts would be turning to Whitehaven and Sheffield Eagles away for 2023. And no doubt having to foot the travel bill for the privilege of playing the Championship’s great and good at home too. At times during that first 40 minutes the atmosphere was more Wetherspoons indecipherable chatter than raucous, frenzied excitement.


The champions made the worst possible start. Ben Davies got way too much leg behind his opening kick-off and watched it sail over the dead ball line for a Toulouse penalty on halfway. Soon after that the league’s bottom club - the first team to beat Saints in Super League this season back in March - were in front. Ex-Wigan man Chris Hankinson was playing at stand-off due largely to the absence of the suspended Corey Norman. Hankinson showed his versatility when his testing bomb landed just over the Saints try line and into the arms of Ilias Bergal. The winger could hardly believe his luck when all he had to do was keep possession and fall to the ground to score. Hankinson could not tag on the extra two but Houles’ side led 4-0.


Saints hit back through Batchelor. The ex-York City Knight was back in his favoured second row position after playing in the centres at Wigan and being rested for Wakefield. He found himself in the right place when Lomax put Lees through a gap in the visitors’ defensive line. On a day of firsts the front rower had the awareness to find Batchelor on his shoulder for Saints’ first try of the afternoon and his first assist of the season. It was Batchelor’s eighth try in Super League and his 10th in all competitions in 2022. Makinson landed his first conversion to put Saints up 6-4.


There followed a period of scrappiness worthy of any Hull v Warrington basement scrap. First Knowles lost the handle on the ball in contact near the halfway line before Hankinson’s pass - intended for Bergal - found only touch on Toulouse’s next raid. Davies, Lees and Lane all then came up with mistakes in possession before Sironen provided a spark. Lomax and Welsby combined with Saints’ young number one - this week nominated for the Young Player Of The Year Award that he won last year - popping up a good looking pass for Sironen to burst on to before rounding the fullback to score.  The ex-Manly Sea Eagle showed all of his quality to score his fourth try of the season. Despite finding it hard to avoid suspension throughout his debut year as a Saint Sironen has managed 22 appearances for his new club and looks like being one of the keys to Saints’ success in the knockout games to come. A strong runner with a liking for getting the ball out of the tackle. Makinson was on target again as Saints pushed out to an 8-point lead at 12-4.


Toulouse then spurned a chance to get back into it. Come the off-season they may reflect that a lack of clinical finishing throughout the year has cost them their place in the top flight. This time the chance came when Dan Norman coughed up possession on his own 20. Houles’ men knocked on the door but didn’t get the answer they wanted when Harrison Hansen couldn’t hang on to it near the try line. 


When the visitors’ next score did arrive it was from a Saints mistake. Welsby was a bit too laid back about getting his kick away on the last play just inside the Saints 40, which allowed Nathan Peats to get a block on it. The ball bounced hard off the former Leigh man and rolled to within five metres of the Saints line before he caught up with it for an easy pick-up and score.  Hankinson added an equally easy two and it was close again, Saints leading by just a couple of points at 12-10 at the break. 


Things got worse for the title holders before they got better. Next to put his name on the scoresheet was another former Centurion, ex-Catalans Dragons hooker Eloi Pelissier. He burrowed over from dummy half, no doubt to the extreme displeasure of the defensively astute Woolf. Toulouse had been a little lucky in the build up too, when an Olly Ashall-Bott pass was batted up in the air by Makinson and grabbed at by Guy Armitage before falling kindly into the arms of Hurrell. However, referee Michael Small ruled that it had gone forward off Makinson first giving Toulouse the position they needed to set up Pelissier’s score. It was right in front of the sticks so Hankinson had little trouble in firing Toulouse into a surprise lead at 16-12.


And that’s when Roby entered the fray. Until then I hadn’t ruled out the notion that the skipper had been named on the bench just to make sure he was in full kit for the trophy lift. You could never see Roby doing a John Terry if he had not been involved in the 17 at all. He’s just not a John Terry sort of guy. He doesn’t lead by ego. Had Saints handled their opponents a little better then lifting the trophy might well have been his only job for the day. As it was he was needed to bring a little more intensity to proceedings, to speed up distribution from dummy half and to make everyone else that little bit better in the way that the true greats often can.


I mentioned earlier that it was a day of firsts for Lees with that maiden assist for Batchelor. When his first try arrived it was one of the real highlights of the afternoon. Not just because it rewarded him for his industry throughout the year - especially in defence - but because he was able to finish a genuinely spectacular move. 


Hurrell did most of the damage, breaking from just inside his own half before finding Lomax. He exchanged passes with Roby before finding Lees on his left hand side. All the prop really had to do was fall over the line. His first of the season was only his third for the club in 108 appearances since his 2017 debut. His last one had been in a 38-12 home win over Warrington in April 2019. Toulouse’s Dominique Peyroux and Joseph Paulo had been among his team-mates that day. The try also got Lees off the nude run, if that is still a thing in modern rugby league culture. I must say I sincerely hope not. I don’t know about you but I don’t want to see some hairy arsed prop screeching by me on Prescot Road on the way home from a few jars at the Bird I’th Hand.


Back to the plot, where Makinson’s third successful conversion of the game had put Saints back in front at 18-16. They would be there to stay. It helped also that they got a fairly generous call from the officials to go further in front. Toulouse has suffered the blow of losing prop Daniel Alvaro to an HIA just after being frustrated when Roby - who else? -  chased back to upend Bergal who was threatening to go clear on the south touchline. 


That intervention looked decisive when Hurrell - receiving it on the right edge from Lomax - kicked ahead and was deemed to have got there just in time to touch down before the ball crossed the dead ball line. It didn’t look quite right live, still looked iffy at full speed on the television and would almost certainly have been ruled out after forensic examination from the VR in a televised game.  But right there, right then it stood and pretty much knocked the stuffing out of the visitors. When Makinson landed the goal from the right hand touchline a comeback looked even less likely at 24-16.


Hurrell’s first regular season as a Saint has yielded 10 tries in 25 appearances in all competitions.  Nine of those have come in Super League. His best return in three years at Leeds is the 14 he managed in 2019 but he only added a further 10 in the last two seasons combined. He’s enjoying something of a new lease of life at the champions and will be around again next year despite the fact that the coach will not.


Before suffering a hamstring injury in Perpignan in July which kept him out for four weeks Makinson was in with a shout of finishing as the league’s leading try scorer. That absence slowed his scoring rate down somewhat but he has added another five tries since returning for the win over Castleford in early August. He was next to score here, and ends the regular season with 22. Four behind Salford’s Ken Sio and nine shy of Bevan French’s league-leading effort of 31. 


Makinson’s latest four-pointer came about as a result of that familiar link up between Welsby and Lomax and was finished off with a trademark leap to the corner. Another touchline conversion took Saints well clear at 30-16, and the winger’s personal points tally for the day up to 14. He has 230 for the regular season at an average of almost 11 points per game across his 21 Super League appearances. Not bad considering he isn’t viewed as the team’s first choice goal-kicker.


Saints had one last flourish before the end. Welsby already had two try assists - taking his season’s tally to 27 behind only Tui Lolohea and Jake Connor - before he grabbed his 12th try of the campaign. Yet many of the plaudits for this one have to go to Bennison. Fielding Hankinson’s desperate chip and chase 10 metres inside his own half the Saints youngster tore through some admittedly bedraggled Toulouse defenders, beating five or six before finally being grabbed around 15 metres out. Bennison still had the presence of mind to offload one-handed to the supporting Welsby who just evaded the last desperate lunge of the defence to give himself an easy task in touching down.  


It would have been another easy two for Makinson had he not handed the responsibility to Lane from in front. A chance for the young winger to get his name on the list of Saints points scorers no matter what happens in his career going forward. He didn’t waste it, pushing Saints out to a 20-point win at 36-16. A margin which never looked likely until Roby entered proceedings in the wake of Pelissier giving Toulouse the lead.


Given his limited minutes you won’t see Roby’s name appear in the significant stats, though he was arguably Saints’ most influential player in his short stint. Sironen was Saints’ best go-forward man statistically with 152 metres, followed by Hurrell with 136. Bennison managed 127 - around 35 of which were on that delirious run through the opposition to set up the final try for Welsby - Makinson another 118 and both Batchelor and Agnatius Paasi 101.


For the French outfit Bergal racked up 142 in a spirited display while all-action footballer’s partner Ashall-Bott made 116. 


As well as getting his first try and assist of the season Lees topped the tackle count with 40. Batchelor is Saints’ top tackler on the season with 736 and he contributed heavily to that here with 37. Lussick did Roby’s regular shift with 31. You would think the visitors would be somewhat busier in defence but only Peyroux (36) and Alvaro (33) topped 30. Houles will be fairly horrified at a missed tackle count of 42 while Saints’ 22 was a marked improvement on the 52 that got away against Wakefield.


Saints made more errors at 13 to 8 but again that is a consequence of having more ball. Despite less possession the bottom club had the edge on offloads at 14-12. Discipline was an issue for them as they conceded eight penalties to just three from Saints. 


Most people stuck around for the post game pleasantries. Roby’s trophy lift was his seventh since taking over the captaincy from simulation enthusiast Jon Wilkin in 2018. It was also a great pleasure to see the injured stars and the season’s young debutants take their part in the celebrations too. Let’s hope we see some of them again at Old Trafford and who knows - hopefully one or two of them might even make it on to the field.


For now Woolf and his troops can sit back and watch as the teams who finished between third and sixth fight it out to face one of Saints or Wigan in the last four. And then a maximum of two games left in Woolf’s reign. But a chance to pull off a unique piece of history with a third Grand Final win in his three seasons, and a fourth in succession for the club. 


We’re not quite at full tilt but it could still happen.


Saints: Bennison, Makinson, Hurrell, Davies, Lane, Welsby, Lomax, Paasi, Lussick, Lees, Sironen, Batchelor, Knowles. Interchanges: Bell, McCarthy-Scarsbrook, Norman, Roby.


Toulouse Olympique: Ashall-Bott, Bergal, Jussaume, Armitage, Laguerre, Hankinson, Paulo, Belmas, Peats, Alvaro, Peyroux, Stefani, Marion. Interchanges: Pelissier, Bretherton, Hansen, Sangare.


Referee: Michael Small








Saints v Toulouse Olympique - Preview

Saints celebrate a record 10th League Leaders Shield when they host Toulouse Olympique on Saturday afternoon (September 3, kick-off 3.00pm).

Aside from the playoff shootout between Leeds and Castleford at Headingley the final round of the 2022 regular season is riddled with dead rubbers. This one is no exception. Saints secured top spot despite losing at home to Wakefield on Monday (August 29) courtesy of Wigan’s loss at Hull KR. A few days previously Toulouse’s relegation back to the Championship after just one season in Super League was confirmed when they lost to Catalans Dragons. Though they have flickered into life at times - especially towards the end of the campaign - the bare facts of the matter are that Sylvain Houles’ side have managed only five wins from their 26 top flight matches ahead of this one. 

The champions’ defeat by Trinity was almost exclusively down to Kristian Woolf’s team selection. He gave first team debuts to four academy products while also including four more players who had previously appeared only once for the first team. Of the debutants only Keane Gilford and Ben Lane keep their places in Woolf’s 21-man squad for this one. Meanwhile Daniel Moss and George Delaney survive among the one-hit wonders. That’s because no fewer than eight first team players come back into the reckoning. 


Jonny Lomax, Jack Welsby, James Roby, Matty Lees, Joe Batchelor and Konrad Hurrell all return along with previously suspended pair Curtis Sironen and Morgan Knowles. Yet this is a Saints side still lacking the services of Will Hopoate, Mark Percival, Regan Grace, Lewis Dodd, Alex Walmsley and Sione Mata’utia through injury. Relatively inexperienced men like Jon Bennison, Ben Davies and Jake Wingfield are set to play a major role in Saints’ bid to reach and then win a fourth consecutive Grand Final. 


They’ll be either helped or hindered by the emotion surrounding the news this week that Woolf will leave the club at the end of the season. The 47 year-old has opted to return to Australia to assist and then succeed Wayne Bennett as the head coach of 2023s new NRL franchise Redcliffe Dolphins. It ends three trophy-filled years at the club for Woolf. As well as winning back-to-back Grand Finals he secured a first Challenge Cup success for the club in 13 years in 2021 and now has the full domestic set of honours after clinching the League Leaders Shield. 


With the changes to his squad the line-up is likely to be somewhat stronger than the one which took on Trinity. Josh Simm misses out meaning that Bennison will probably be required to fill one wing spot opposite Tommy Makinson. The real significance of that is that it prevents Bennison from playing fullback and so freeing Welsby up to partner Lomax in the halves. Instead Welsby will likely start at fullback and either Ben Davies or James Roby will go in alongside Lomax. At Wigan last weekend it was Davies, with the skipper unmoved at his familiar number nine role backed up by Joey Lussick. Davies’ centre role went to Batchelor. That wasn’t a roaring success but the defensive intensity of the French side is unlikely to match that of Wigan on derby day.


Without Walmsley there is a hopefully temporary vacancy at prop. McCarthy-Scarsbrook is in contention having started last time out but the nod may go to the much more impactful Agnatius Paasi. Matty Lees should take the other front row berth. If Batchelor stays in the centres then one of James Bell or Jake Wingfield could partner Sironen in the back row ahead of Knowles at 13. 


There’s more than a sprinkling of former Saints in Toulouse boss Sylvain Houles’ party. Dom Peyroux and Joseph Paulo were around when Saints’ successful run began under Justin Holbrook. The former played at Old Trafford in both 2019 under Holbrook and in Woolf’s first triumph in 2020. Meanwhile Andrew Dixon played 67 times for Saints between 2009-12. 


Eloi Pelissier and Harrison Hansen are Super League veterans while Matty Russell has played in a Grand Final for Warrington after starting out his career at Wigan. Another ex-Wiganer - Chris Hankinson - has shown his qualities at times in a difficult year and has been a hugely impressive goal-kicker. Up front the signing of Daniel Alvaro from St George-Illawarra Dragons has helped beef up the pack. The glaring weakness of the side is in the halves at the moment. Recently recruited NRL star Corey Norman copped an eight game ban following some highly unsavoury antics in a recent defeat to Warrington which always looked terminal to their survival hopes. Behind him both former Catalans Dragons playmakers Lucas Albert and Tony Gigot are unavailable. It’s tough to see where Houles’ men will break down the Saints defence with so many of Woolf’s stars back on deck. 


Toulouse’s relegation back to the Championship has reopened the debates about expansion and about promotion and relegation. A significant number of observers take the view that as a club from a genuine expansion, non M62 area Toulouse should have been made exempt from relegation for three years as was the case with Catalans when they arrived in Super League in 2006. Others would go further and scrap relegation altogether. 


My own feeling is that promotions should be earned on the field as should the right to stay in the top flight once you get there. Yet the conditions around promotion do not currently give Championship clubs - particularly French sides - a genuine chance of staying afloat. The Million Pound Game - which determines the promoted side - happens too late for any thorough planning and quality recruitment to take place in preparation for the following year. Add to that the repeated suggestion that the French sides are still paying for the English sides to travel to fixtures in France and it is easy to see why they find it difficult from the outset. 


We must address these issues and stop acting only in the best interests of the established Super League clubs.  At the same time those sounding the death knell for the whole sport on account of one team sitting outside Super League are guilty of hyperbole and short-termism. This should not be a Toronto situation. Toulouse will no doubt return and be better for this experience when they do. But let’s give them a fair enough crack next time.


As you might expect there isn’t much in the way of a history between these two. When this one ends 50% of all meetings will have taken place in 2022. Prior to Toulouse’s promotion there was only a 1952 tour match won 31-5 by the French outfit and a 2010 Challenge Cup tie which Saints breezed through 56-16. This year, Toulouse shocked Saints 22-20 in early March before Saints gained a measure of revenge with a 28-14 win in June. Both of those meetings were in France. If Toulouse can win the series 2-1 it would be quite the feather in the cap and a memory to cherish as they are working their way back up next year.


But it couldn’t happen, could it? Probably not. Woolf’s squad selection is an indication that he wants to recover the winning habit all the way to Old Trafford before his departure. And with a trophy to collect at the end of this one the players, coach and the crowd should have plenty of energy about them. All of which could be in stark contrast to Toulouse who face a frustrating period away from the top table even if it is not quite the extinction event that some suggest. 


Squads;


St Helens;


1. Jack Welsby, 2. Tommy Makinson, 6. Jonny Lomax, 9. James Roby, 10. Matty Lees, 12. Joe Batchelor, 13. Morgan Knowles, 14. Joey Lussick, 15. LMS, 16. Curtis Sironen, 17. Agnatius Paasi, 19. Jake Wingfield, 20. James Bell, 22. Ben Davies, 23. Konrad Hurrell, 24. Dan Norman, 27. Jon Bennison, 33. Daniel Moss, 34. George Delaney, 38. Keane Gilford, 39. Ben Lane.


Toulouse Olympique;


4. Matthieu Jussaume 5. Paul Marcon 10. Harrison Hansen 11. Andrew Dixon 12. Dominique Peyroux 13. Anthony Marion 14. Eloi Pelissier 15. Maxime Puech 16. Joe Bretherton 17. Joseph Paulo 20. Ilias Bergal 21. Chris Hankinson 23. Justin Sangare 24. Guy Armitage 25. Matty Russell 27. Olly Ashall-Bott 28. Nathan Peats 29. Lambert Belmas 30. Maxime Stefani 35. Daniel Alvaro. Benjamin Laguerre


Referee: Michael Small




Up The Jumper - Are modern tactics killing our game?

I should have written this sooner. In the midst of Saints’ four Grand Final wins in a row between 2019-2022 I was one of the few dissenting,...