Saints returned to the domestic scene with an eventful but ultimately comfortable 24-6 win at Castleford.
Conquering the NRL champion Penrith Panthers on their own patch was bound to take a physical toll on Saints. Head coach Paul Wellens - taking charge of his first Super League game - was without a clutch of stars who had helped turn Saints into world champions eight days previously. Tommy Makinson was ruled out due to the concussion protocols having been forced out of the World Club Challenge in the first half. Captain James Roby was rested for this one while minor knocks kept out Will Hopoate and Agnatius Paasi. Curtis Sironen was also out due to illness, and with Joe Batchelor injured in the World Club Challenge warm-up win over St George-Illawarra Dragons it meant that James Bell started in the back row alongside Sione Mata’utia.
Makinson’s absence gave Tee Ritson his Super League debut following his officially loan move from Barrow Raiders while Hopoate’s wing spot from the Panthers game was occupied by Jon Bennison. Joey Lussick was an ever present during the 2022 campaign but this was nevertheless a rare starting opportunity for the former Salford and Parramatta man.
Castleford had lost at Hull in their opening fixture. Head coach Lee Radford was without Mahe Fonua so former Leeds man Jack Broadbent started at centre. A certain Mr Westerman was conspicuous by his absence, no doubt to the bitter disappointment of the chant lyricists among the Saints following.
Though this was ultimately comfortable on the scoreboard for Saints there were moments - particularly early on - when a more clinical team than Radford’s would have posted plenty of points. The first points of the match did not arrive until the 23rd minute when Jack Welsby took Jonny Lomax’s short ball to go over under the sticks. The build-up had featured a picturesque flick-pass by the outstanding Mark Percival to Lewis Dodd.
Yet before all this Jake Mamo had twice shredded Saints’ right edge defence only to butcher the crucial pass to the supporting Niall Evalds on each occasion. Mamo finished the game with a Brian To’o-like 208 metres with ball in hand. The former Huddersfield and Warrington eccentric was the only player on either side to top 200 metres. Which just goes to show that it’s not all about stats. He carved out a third opportunity in the second half but was dealt with expertly by Welsby on that occasion.
Makinson is among the best defensive wingers in world rugby league but it would probably be overly simplistic and a tad unfair to blame this uncharacteristic weakness down the Saints right edge on Ritson alone. Defending is a team effort and it will no doubt take time for the new man to gel with his team-mates and to develop an understanding with his right edge centre Konrad Hurrell. It seemed more a question of positioning on that edge than any inability of any individual to make tackles.
That Welsby try - converted by Percival - provided the only points of the first half. While Mamo was busy fluffing Castleford’s best opportunities Saints had a few of their own which were scuppered by poor decision making. Bell tore through the Tigers line on one occasion only to inexplicably attempt to kick ahead for Ritson with tackles still remaining. It was a poorly executed kick which trickled over the sideline before Ritson could latch on to it. Then Dodd suffered a brain explosion, dabbing towards the in-goal having failed to realise that referee Liam Moore had awarded Saints a fresh set of six. But going into the break you got the feeling that Saints would eventually find their clinical edge and ultimately punish Mamo and the Tigers for their profligacy.
Which is exactly how it played out. When the next breakthrough came it was Ritson who profited with a try on his Super League debut. Cas had again started the second half steadily enough, going set for set with Saints for the first five minutes. That was until a scruffy Hurrell offload hit the deck and was scooped up by Lomax. He mesmerised the Cas defence with a dummy and a weaving run before finding Ritson outside him to do the rest. It wasn’t the kind of neat and tidy, by the coaching manual sort of try we saw so often under Kristian Woolf but improvised tries count for four points just the same. Percival tacked on two more and Saints led 12-0.
Cas didn’t just roll over as many sides facing a two score deficit to Saints might have done. Ten minutes into the second half they got on the scoreboard in circumstances which have been the subject of much debate but which to me seemed perfectly above board. They worked the ball left through Jacob Miller, Gareth Widdop and Evalds to put Broadbent away down the channel. That leaky Saints right edge defence split apart again. The only man who could stop a certain try at this point was Welsby.
He did so, but his methods left much to be desired in the mind of Moore. Having over-pursued Broadbent as the Tigers man stepped inside him Welsby threw out a desperate arm which caught Broadbent around the neck. Some of my fellow Saints fans have suggested that it came off the shoulder but if I’m being honest I wouldn’t want to buy a scarf off those observers. It was not the type of direct contact with the head to justify a red card but it looked a textbook example of foul play preventing a try, and therefore a penalty try.
In any case the awarding of a penalty try is dependent only on the referee’s opinion of whether a try would have been scored without the foul play. It was very difficult to argue with Moore’s reasoning. The decision probably spared Welsby a spell in the sin-bin as to do so would have been to punish Saints twice for the same offence. Rugby league’s version of double jeopardy. Yet it is slightly surprising that no ban was handed out when the disciplinary committee met earlier this week. Surprising but understandable. It wasn’t the worst tackle you’ve ever seen and who in their right mind can be arsed attending another three appeal hearings with Mike Rush?
Former Saint Jordan Turner had replaced Fonua in the centre position and he missed an opportunity to get Cas right back in it. Miller’s bomb was caught expertly by the lively Broadbent but the former Rhino’s attempt to offload to Turner squirmed away from the 2014 Grand Final winner. Welsby was required defensively again when Evalds broke through but with the Cas fullback lacking support he was unable to evade his opposite number.
Welsby is more celebrated for his exploits at the other end of the field and it was he who created the crucial next try which put a bit of distance between the sides again. Fed by Hurrell, the Saints fullback dabbed an expertly weighted kick through the defensive line where Alex Walmsley was first to it to score. As he rose to celebrate the TV pictures captured the gruesome state of his blood-stained ear. He looked like Evander Holyfield after running into a mentally unstable Mike Tyson all those years ago. Yet Moore saw no reason to force him off the field to get patched up as Percival was on target again with the conversion.
With Mamo off the field by now the Broadbent-Turner combination seemed like the only way back into the contest for Radford’s side. Yet every time they tried to link up something went wrong. Broadbent made a long break but when he tried to find Turner on his outside the pass was off target. Despite his attempts to juggle it around his back Turner could not reel it in.
Within a couple of minutes it was done and dusted. The combination of Lomax and Welsby found Walmsley on the charge. He held off two defenders on a 20 metre rampage towards his second try of the afternoon. Another Percival goal opened up a 24-6 lead and ensured that Saints started their bid for a fifth consecutive title with a win.
There was just one more cruel indignity for Cas to suffer before the end. Bureta Fairamo thought he had managed a consolation score when he raced down the right flank to touch down having intercepted a Lomax pass. Yet replays showed that the ex-Hull winger had grounded the ball on the touchline inside the in-goal area.
It was close and he might have got away with it in a non-TV game but ultimately Fairamo was found guilty of one of the stupidest gaffes in the history of the sport. Right up there with Shaun Ainscough’s wild hack towards his own goal line which set up a winning try for Featherstone against Ainscough’s Batley, or Ryan Atkins’ needless acrobatics which cost Warrington a try in their 2018 opening night defeat by Leeds. Fairamo undoubtedly murdered what should have been an easy four points but credit is due to Matty Lees for chasing back and restricting the amount of space available to the Tigers winger.
Other than Mamo the stat leaders in terms of metres made for Cas were Broadbent with 172, the careless Fairamo with 161 and Evalds with 140. For Saints it was Hurrell with 187, Bell with 184, Walmsley with 163, Lomax with 148, Mata’utia with 139 and Percival who had 102. Defensively there was a chance to shine for others with Roby absent. Perhaps predictably it was his understudy Lussick who topped the count for Saints with 32 tackles. For Cas Muizz Mustapha managed 40, Paul McShane 34 and both Kenny Edwards and Adam Milner had 33.
Though they didn’t always come off Saints had 13 offloads which is more than three Super League sides have managed in their two outings so far, remembering that Saints have only played once. There does seem to be more of a willingness to take a risk under Wellens but the new coach has struck a decent balance so far between expansiveness and safety first football.
The champions welcome Leeds Rhinos in round two. It is likely that a few of those who missed this one will feature in the early season repeat of last year’s Grand Final. The Rhinos have started the year in their familiarly dreadful early season form and with a big crowd behind them for their home opener it is hard to see Saints failing to add another win to the one they picked up at what used to be called Wheldon Road.
Saints; Welsby, Ritson, Hurrell, Percival, Bennison, Lomax, Dodd, Walmsley, Lussick, Lees, Mata’utia, Bell, Knowles. Interchanges: McCarthy-Scarsbrook, Wingfield, Norman, Royle.
Tigers: Evalds, Fairamo, Broadbent, Turner, Mamo, Widdop, Miller, Griffin, McShane, Vete, Edwards, Mellor, Lawler. Interchanges: Mustapha, Milner, Watts, Robb.
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