Saints continue what has been an uncertain start to their 2023 Super League campaign with a visit to face Huddersfield Giants at the John Smith’s Stadium on Thursday night (March 23, kick-off 8.00pm).
You wouldn’t expect your four-in-a-row Super League champions and now world champions to have lost two of their first four league games at the start of the year but that is where we are. An opening stroll over Castleford Tigers was followed by two strangely similar, anaemic defeats at home against Leeds Rhinos and then at Leigh Leopards. Both games seemed perfectly in hand for new Head Coach Paul Wellens before both somehow slipped away. A last-gasp Blake Austin drop-goal saw Headingley’s Riders Of Rohan smuggle the points away before a 20-12 defeat at Leigh Sports Village in which Saints unfortunately showed all the ruthlessness of my cat playing with a recently caught vole.
Saints just took too long to to finish the job, seemingly believing it enough to hold their feet in front of the fire at a two-score distance for an hour or so and that they would not keep. They did not. With former internationals like Josh Charnley and Zak Hardaker within their ranks the Leopards have strike which they used to great effect on that occasion.
Saints then bounced back with a 20-12 home win over Hull FC which saw them live on their nerves at times but prove worthy winners. The big scare came when Jake Wingfield’s drop allowed Jake Clifford a very cheap score to get Hull to within four after Jack Welsby’s try had provided a little margin for error. Jon Bennison settled it - overcoming his disappointment at missing out on the World Club Challenge win over Penrith to since start every game on the wing - with two decisive and clinically executed tries. Bennison can fill in anywhere along the back line and is absolute money when he does. Like much of Saints’ continually excellent youth products he just has that mentality to do it when it is required.
The Giants - much fancied again under Ian Watson - have also started with two wins and two defeats from their first four outings. They began with a 26-16 defeat by the Always-Their-Year Warrington Wolves who can still be found battling for early season supremacy with five wins out of five alongside Catalans Dragons. Then came a strangely difficult 8-0 toil to get over a Wakefield Trinity side at that time in the midst of a run of three games without scoring. The Tigers were then blown away 36-6 before the Giants came up slightly short in a testing visit from Wigan. Matty Peet’s Buffet Warriors held on for a 14-12 success and served notice that they will still be around at the top like the annual boil on the arse that they are.
Wellens’ squad selection for this one has been complicated by disciplinary issues. It was announced yesterday that Morgan Knowles had received a one-match penalty notice for a late challenge towards the end of the Hull FC win. As I understand it this is currently being appealed. In the meantime, if Knowles is successful with his appeal he will be added to the party. If not then another player will be named.
It all throws up fairly tedious echoes of Grand Final week when Knowles controversially had some other misdeed pardoned and was allowed to play in the showpiece event. It was my view then and remains my view now that the club - and Mr Rush in particular - had no business appealing what I saw as a fairly blatant piece of foul play in the semi-final. While the likes of Sione Mata’utia, Curtis Sironen and more recently Konrad Hurrell continue to miss games through suspension we seem to have developed a weird fixation on refusing to allow this player to be disciplined.
His latest indiscretion seems a trifling offence but would it really do him or the team too much harm to occasionally allow him to sit it it out and reflect on how to improve his technique? This is a domestically dominant world champion team. It does not live or die on the presence of one player who - while one of the top Super League players of the day - is not the all encompassing saviour and all-time club great that some like to cast him as. Let it go.
Breaking - It seems that the authorities have taken the decision out of our own hands. The Rush parlour trick is unsuccessful this time and Knowles will miss out. His place in the 21 will now go to new utility signing Wesley Bruines.
Wellens has been boosted by the return of some of his more important strike players this week. Hurrell is included after his red card against his former club the Rhinos, while the return of Mark Percival to the squad is timely especially given that Ben Davies now faces five or six weeks out with an ankle problem. Even Will Hopoate is back involved in the mix for a three-quarter spot. That could allow Tommy Makinson to revert back to the wings from the centres and maybe put pressure back on Tee Ritson for his place once more. Bennison would be entitled to feel filthy if left out while the 1, 6 & 7 trio of Welsby, Jonny Lomax and Lewis Dodd has been a permanent fixture.
In the forwards most of the movement has been in the back row. Joe Batchelor has not featured yet because of injury so the recent return of Sironen and this week’s addition of Mata’utia are significant. Like Bennison - James Bell has shrugged off personal World Club Challenge disappointment to step up and start solidly and reliably in recent weeks. This is a guy who if selected will still only be making his 23rd first team appearance since joining from Leigh in November 2021. And I don’t have a single worry about him. His offload for Welsby’s crucial try against FC on Friday night (March 17) was an example of his skill and his poise.
The front row has largely been of the ‘same as last year’ philosophy that is the hallmark of many a champion side with the great James Roby backed up by Joey Lussick and the monstrous presence of Alex Walmsley at prop backed up by the consistent Matty Lees and the often explosive Agnatius Paasi.
This week’s Giants headline is the possible second debut of Jake Connor. The star playmaker played in West Yorkshire between 2013-16 and now returns after a five-year spell at Hull FC. Most recently spent trying to convince everyone that he and Luke Gale a) get on fine and b) are a serviceable and reliable halfback partnership for a modern contender. That pretence has been dropped and Connor is about to be re-injected into the Giants mix having had his restart delayed by injuries. It is a big year for him as the suspicion mounts that he will always be just that bit too much of a risk. Undoubtedly gifted but fatally flawed. Defensively as well as in terms of his mentality.
One of the fascinations will be to see whether Watson can get a tune out of Connor and Will Pryce this year. Either as a pair or as a multi-facetted attack division along with gifted fullback Tui Lolohea and former Saints bomb manufacturer Theo Fages. The Frenchman is out injured this week but the other three all feature in Watson’s 21-man selection. As does three-time Saints Grand Final winner Kevin Naiqama, who I’m sure would have been a handy presence in helping break down those beaten-looking Leeds and Leigh sides before they bit back. Of all the the things that bite perhaps the salary cap does so the hardest when you have enjoyed such success.
The Giants still rely on Chris Hill to lead their pack along with another ageing Chris - last year’s try-scoring sensation McQueen. They have lost the excellent Danny Levi to the NRL once more and the Canberra Raiders, but have added Esan Marsters and Jake Bibby to their ranks. They are still clearly finding their rhythms for 2023 but will be a major threat on home soil this week.
The teams last met in the Super League in Huddersfield last April when Saints took it 24-12. Percival, Bennison and Lomax were all try-scorers for Saints along with Batchelor, while for the Giants Lolohea and Ash Golding crosssed. It was something of a phoney war back then with the Giants having made major changes. This time both could do with the win following their own unconvincing early season form. We should hopefully see cork come off of the top of this one.
Squads;
Giants;
Ashton Golding, Chris McQueen, Chris Hill, Esan Marsters, Harry Rushton, Harvey Livett, Innes Senior, Jake Connor, Jack Ashworth, Jake Bibby, Kevin Naiqama, Leroy Cudjoe, Luke Yates, Nathan Peats, Olly Russell, Olly Wilson, Owen Trout, Sam Halsall, Seb Ikahihifo, Tui Lolohea, Will Pryce
Saints;
1. Jack Welsby, 2. Tommy Makinson, 3. Will Hopoate, 4. Mark Percival, 5. Jon Bennison, 6. Jonny Lomax, 7. Lewis Dodd, 8. Alex Walmsley, 9. James Roby, 10. Matty Lees, 11. Sione Mata’utia, 14. Joey Lussick, 15. Louie McCarthy-Scarsbrook, 16. Curtis Sironen, 17. Agnatius Paasi, 19. James Bell, 22. Sam Royle, 23. Konrad Hurrell, 25. Tee Ritson, 30. George Delaney, 34. Wesley Bruines.
No comments:
Post a Comment