It was a truly Magic Weekend for Saints as Paul Wellens’ side breezed past the troubled Huddersfield Giants at Newcastle on Sunday (June 4).
A fourth consecutive win in all competitions lifted the champions back into the top six. But more than that it was the manner of the destruction of Ian Watson’s men which has us all believing again. Victory over Wigan in this coming Friday’s home derby (June 9) could take Saints as high as third by end of this weekend. When you consider that the world champs still have a game in hand on all those above them - also against the Giants - a bid for the top two in the second half of the season starts to look plausible.
The Team News
To achieve that Saints will probably need to be lucky with injuries and better with their discipline. For this one Wellens was able to pick from arguably the strongest squad he has had available all season. The only notable absentee was Morgan Knowles who served the second of a two-game suspension for that moment of sheer lunacy in the dying embers of the cup win over Halifax Panthers a fortnight ago. Mark Percival returned from a hamstring injury which has kept him out since the middle of April. Matty Lees - suspended for two games for a high shot on Shane Wright in the home win over Salford on May 13 - was also available.
Both came straight back into the starting line-up meaning Louie McCarthy-Scarsbrook reverted to a place on the bench while Will Hopoate, Jake Wingfield and Jon Bennison missed out altogether. If players of that caliber are missing out on selection for the 17 it suggests you have a bit of depth available. Good players are now being left out. And so is Hopoate.
The Game Story
This was expected to be tough. Saints squeaked by the Giants by just two points when they met in March. In addition neither side came in with any convincing form. Both had won their previous game, but Saints had done it in extremely unconvincing fashion at Leeds while Huddersfield’s win over Castleford last time out followed a run of three straight defeats by both Hull clubs and Leigh.
For a while it was tight. So much so that the Giants even managed to score first. Six minutes had gone by when Tui Lolohea kicked into an alarming amount of space in Saints left defensive channel. It appeared that the race was between Jack Welsby and ex-Wigan plodder Jake Bibby but both managed to miss the ball and collide with each other to allow Kevin Naiqama to touch down. It was the Fijian’s sixth try of the season and a familiar sight to Saints fans who saw him cross 39 times in three Grand Final-winning seasons in the red vee. Jake Connor’s afternoon peaked right here as he added the conversion to put the Giants 6-0 ahead.
It took Saints three minutes to respond. When they did there was more than a touch of controversy about it. But Saints won this one by sufficient distance that we don’t need to spend long quibbling about the suspiciously offside Jonny Lomax’s involvement in it. He looked in front of Lewis Dodd when the Saints half put up the lob that was claimed by Joe Batchelor and offloaded to Welsby before he brought Hurrell back on the inside to crash through Lolohea to score. It was reviewed to check for offside but video referee Liam Moore seemed interested only in Hurrell and Tommy Makinson. The Saints winger - who would go on to match the four tries he scored in a Challenge Cup tie against York eight years ago - started his afternoon with a fluffed conversion.
Saints hit the front to stay on 18 minutes. Curtis Sironen conjured up an offload for Welsby who sensed the supporting Percival on his inside. The centre went over untouched for his 111th Saints try in 207 appearances. It was only his third of the current season as the injury lay-offs get ever more frequent, but it was a joyous reminder of the knack he has for finding the try line when his body is co-operating. Makinson was on target this time and Saints led 10-6.
Before he could bag any more points the England winger had to withstand an ugly cannonball tackle which earned Luke Yates a spell in the sin bin. Makinson was held up by two Huddersfield defenders when Yates shot in at knees which have seen better days. It was dangerous, unnecessary and grubby from Yates and I would have liked to have seen him sent from the field for good rather than just the 10 minutes he received. Eye-poppingly, the Giants man did not receive a ban when the Match Review Panel met to impart their wisdom on Monday (June 5).
Instead he received a fine which was initially what Alex Walmsley received for his part in Joe Greenwood’s brief loss of consciousness two minutes after Yates’ departure. Yet as the appeals panel have accepted it was demonstrably a head clash which led to Greenwood’s injury and subsequent failure of an HIA. Which has forced the disciplinary committee into another embarrassing climbdown. Increasingly, operate in a similar way to the government. Make a piss poor decision, see if it will fly and then reverse it as soon as possible after the flak starts flying. Oh but don’t forget to claim the credit for making the decision you should have made in the first place.
Eight minutes before half-time Saints put some genuine daylight between themselves and their opponents. Hurrell earned a penalty when he was knocked down off the ball by Esan Marsters. That set Saints up for a crack at the try line from where James Roby, Dodd and Lomax combined before Welsby’s killer ball out wide to Makinson. After diving in at the corner he got up to kick the goal from the touchline to put Saints 16-6 ahead.
An error-strewn end to the half included a 50 metre gallop by Batchelor following a Connor fumble close to Saints line, and a missed opportunity for Saints when Dodd tried to hit Agnatius Paasi with a flat short ball when a pass to one of the runners out of the back seemed more prudent. It would have caused more mayhem than a golf merger and almost certainly resulted in Saints’ fourth try. Dodd will need to develop that decision making if he’s going to make it big in the NRL.
Saints’ dominance was absolute after the break. They rattled in 32 unanswered points on their way to a hugely impressive win. It started when Connor was pinged for a ball steal on halfway which put Wellens’ side in position again. They didn’t need asking twice. Dodd found a clever inside ball to a rampaging McCarthy-Scarsbrook who powered over for the first try of what is expected to be his final season in the red vee.
It was his 63rd try for Saints in 358 appearances, almost 200 of which have come off the bench during his logic-defying 12-year stint with the club. He has copped his fair share of criticism on these pages, particularly for the concentration lapses and histrionics which have plagued parts of his career. But he can show me his medals. Five Grand Final wins and the possibility of a sixth, a Challenge Cup win and a World Club Challenge title. The Phil Neville of rugby league. McCarthy-Scarsbrook’s try offered an easy conversion for Makinson and Saints led 22-6.
As much as Saints may have got away with one in the first half when Lomax looked offside, they had what looked a pretty fair one snatched away from them three minutes after McCarthy-Scarsbrook’s effort. Great play between Welsby, Sironen and Percival had the Giants defence in a muddle before Lomax fired an exquisite long ball to Makinson who squeezed in at the corner again. Only referee Marcus Griffiths decided it was forward and chalked it off. It looked a very dubious call to say the least.
Not to worry as two minutes later Saints repeated the trick, this time to the satisfaction of Griffiths but only after a needless video review. Connor had gifted Saints possession and territory by hoofing one straight into touch on the full. From there Roby, Dodd and Welsby combined to allow Lomax to put Makinson over for his second try. Griffiths wanted to check that Makinson had not put a foot in touch before the grounding but it wasn’t even close. The patch of grass on Saints’ right edge between the 10 metre line and the try line was taking a hammering but there were no footprints on the whitewash. By now brimming with confidence Makinson got up and landed a picturesque conversion from that touchline to put Saints 28-6 up with more than half an hour to go.
Though it happened often, it wasn’t always Makinson who benefitted from Saints torching the Giants’ left defensive edge. The next try saw Hurrell briefly draw level with his wing man with two tries for the afternoon. Again it was the product of precision ball movement from Roby, Dodd, Lomax and Welsby but this time it was the latter who grabbed the assist and the former Leeds Rhino who crossed for the score. Welsby would finish the day with four assists and 13 for the season. Only alliteration’s Lachlan Lam of Leigh has more throughout Super League this term. The two which Lomax provided leave him in the top 10 also, sat in eighth with 11 scoring passes.
Makinson could not add the extras this time but it scarcely mattered for anything other than his own stats and his pursuit of Sean Long’s record number of points in a Magic Weekend game. The greatest of all Super League halfbacks had racked up 27 in a 57-16 win over Wigan at Cardiff in 2008. With Saints annihilating Huddersfield on that right edge time after time the fascination in this one by this point was in how many tries and points Makinson could pick up. The possibility of Saints v Giants being a contest had long since departed.
The Makinson hat-trick duly arrived six minutes after his second. Saints had forced a goal-line drop-out when Dodd, McCarthy-Scarsbrook and Sione Mata’utia forced Bibby back over his own try line. In the ensuing set some dizzyingly quick hands from The Usual Suspects of Dodd, Welsby, Lomax and finally Hurrell put Makinson over again. This time he was able to convert to give Saints a 38-6 lead and push his own personal tally to 22 points. He also had his first try hat-trick since a 42-8 win at Hull KR in March of last year.
A whole eight minutes passed before he picked up his fourth. Again Connor was involved in creating Saints’ opportunity but in fairness his intervention on this occasion probably stopped a try from being scored a little earlier. The former FC man knocked down Dodd’s pass to Welsby when the Giants defence looked outnumbered. Yet nobody in a Huddersfield shirt could do anything about Lomax’s long ball out to Makinson who again did the rest. His third missed conversion of the day prevented him from taking Long’s record there and then but there were still 15 minutes to go. And he did have the second four-try haul of his career - his first against Super League opposition - to be going on with.
It was perhaps fitting that the record finally came after a try which will take some beating when the Try Of The Season gong gets handed out. Saints were enduring a rare spell of Huddersfield pressure, relieved when Welsby scooped up Lolohea’s grubber close to the Saints line. Catching out tired, frustrated and no doubt emotional Giants chasers the Saints fullback tore down the field, making it into the Huddersfield half before he was collared by Innes Senior. Yet that wasn’t the end of the story as Welsby found Makinson in support. He produced the kind of no-look flick-pass you can try when you are 42-6 up. It was audacious but effective and very, very Saintsy. The beneficiary was Joey Lussick, who rounded Leroy Cudjoe with absurd ease before going over in the corner. It capped a flowing, length of the field move of the kind you don’t see too often these days and was the undoubted highlight of a hugely impressive performance.
There was no time for Makinson to admire his part in it. He had a record to break. Still one point behind Long’s mark he needed to convert from the sideline again to claim a new one. Which he did with the minimum of fuss. As good as he was at finishing his tries one of the more eye-catching elements of Makinson’s 28-point performance was his goal-kicking from the touchline. It was those from further in-field that he struggled with as he finished with six goals from nine attempts, 28 points and the record. Saints finished with a 48-6 win. By far their biggest of the season and probably a performance which usurped the 28-6 win over Warrington in April as the best of 2023 so far.
The Stats Bit
He hasn’t got a mention yet but Saints’ top metre maker on the day was Tee Ritson. The left winger watched on while Makinson hoovered up all of the opportunities on the other side of the field. Yet the ex-Barrow man was his usual, willing and lightning fast presence throughout. He picked up 145 metres, one more than Makinson on 144. A large chunk of Ritson’s ground gaining may have come on one play late in the game when he picked up Mata’utia’s pass on his own 20 metre line, streaked down the sideline and beat Cudjoe but was somehow dragged down inside the Giants 10 metre line by Naiqama.
Mata’utia contributed a further 129 metres himself which is more than handy off the bench. It is only two behind Welsby at 131, and he was the next best after Ritson and Makinson. Hurrell added 127 to go with his two tries and an assist. Others topping the 100 mark were Bell (118) and McCarthy-Scarsbrook and Batchelor (both 109). It must have been Walmsley’s day off. Well, if anyone deserves one…
The Giants didn’t make a lot of headway, perhaps because of the Everest-like slope which Watson referenced in his post-match ramblings. The bulk of what ground they did make was the work of Senior with 112 metres and Lolohea with 109.
Defensively only Batchelor (34) and Lees (30) were required to make 30+ tackles for Saints. That might have had something to do with an improved effort with ball security. Saints were guilty of a fairly average 10 errors which is markedly more sensible than the carnage we saw at Headingley last time out. The Giants had to bend their backs without the ball a little more with Nathan Peats called upon to make 50 stops. Cudjoe came up with 38, Chris McQueen 35 and Yates 32. I do hope that whoever compiles Super League’s stats doesn’t count cannonballs.
Tellingly, all of Connor, Lolohea, Marsters and Matty English missed six tackles apiece. A whole set each. It was that sort of day. Nobody on the Saints side missed more than five. That was a feat achieved by the strangely off colour Walmsley. He doesn’t normally have two average games in a row which I’m sure is news to gladden the hearts of all Wigan fans. As if they’re reading.
This Can’t Be A False Dawn
Wigan is always an important game for obvious reasons but this Friday’s meeting (June 9) might just have taken on further importance with this week’s results. Twenty-four hours before Saints brushed aside Watson’s troops the Peety Pies were dismantled by the now league-leading Catalans Dragons. Saints will go above Wigan with a win while Salford and Leigh are among those who could do the same if they pick up two points and the Warriors are defeated in the derby. In the snakes and ladders of a congested league table any of the sides from third to sixth could find themselves out of a playoff place if results go against them this weekend. The salary cap might just be beginning to work. Which is probably why an increase has just been announced.
The tightly packed table makes it all the more important that Saints build on their Magic performance. This can’t be a false dawn. We all got very excited for our prospects after that Warrington win only to produce an inconsistent performance against Salford disguised by a mesmerising 15-minute four-try spell. That was followed by rather getting away with it at Leeds after a fairly flat display. It still feels like a bit of a rollercoaster which - while it might be fun to be on at times - is not something we can afford in the second half of the season if we have genuine top two ambitions.
Should Knowles Come Straight Back In?
The 21-man squad for the visit of Wigan has been named and it contains the name of Morgan Knowles. The loose forward was the one regular member of most people’s strongest 17 missing from the Magic Weekend line-up as he served the final game of his latest suspension. For many the opportunity to bring him back into the line-up - and from the start - will be a no brainer. Yet there are still considerations for Wellens to take into account.
It used to be the case that people picking sports teams were reluctant to make changes to their sides if they were winning. If it ain’t broke and all that. I wouldn’t necessarily subscribe to that if Knowles had been playing well this year but he hasn’t really been on the field enough to find any rhythm. Meanwhile Bell has not missed out on any of Saints’ matches in all competitions in 2023, starting the last seven at loose forward. He’s fit, in form and deserves to play.
But this is professional sport where you don’t always get what you deserve. Look at Everton. It is likely that Wellens will bring Knowles back in and that Bell could be the fall guy. That’s a risk for me. I’d be worried that the first thing that will happen if you bring Knowles into a derby environment - particularly one with potential playoff implications and after a period of suspension - is that he will get embroiled in some nonsense with Wigan’s band of grubs before doing something royally heinous or stupid and finding himself sat in the stands for another month. I’d be very, very tempted to stick with Bell and the rest of that winning team. I will be genuinely amazed if Wellens agrees.
Should Magic Stay?
A short while ago the word around the campfire was that new rugby league overlords IMG were putting a stop to Magic. They’d rightly sensed a desire to rid the game of loop fixtures and decided that Magic was no exception just because it had a fancy name and came with a chance to get trolleyed in Newcastle.
Now it doesn’t seem so clear. The latest version of Magic was among the more successful editions. The crowds were good, many of the games were exciting and the sun came out. Heck, if next time you don’t put it up against an all-Manchester FA Cup final it may even get some excellent TV ratings. Regardless, a good time was had by all.
All of which might have changed a few minds. Even before the weekend there seemed to be a push from some of the clubs to persuade IMG that Magic needs to stay. So is the tide - seemingly flowing towards a rethink - turning back in Magic’s favour?
Well, that might depend on whose decision it is. If the clubs have the power to decide that it should continue then what are IMG for? Didn’t we bring them in because it was felt that the clubs had too much power and were too often making decisions out of self interest? And is the drive to suppress that power in itself a reason for IMG to fight to have it scrapped? What if it turns out that it is and can continue to be a success after all? IMG’s stance now appears to be that it will be a consideration when they look at next year’s rugby league calendar. Pretty vague but not the definite no that it had appeared previously. Amid some droning about stadium availability and clashes with other events there seemed to be a suggestion that there is now an appetite to retain it.
I’ve long since been in favour of removing it. Not because I don’t like it. I’ve never been but it is one of the best weekends of the year as a rugby league fan watching on TV. I’ve been against it because the extra fixtures distort the competition and because we haven’t been getting very much from it in terms of growing the game in new areas. It has always been a jolly for existing rugby league fans who fancy a weekend away on the sauce. There isn’t too much wrong with that until those same people are on social media complaining that we can’t fill Wembley for the Challenge Cup final or Old Trafford for the Grand Final. That we should take them both to Bolton Wanderers because rugby league folk can get a train there and won’t need a hotel room. But has anyone ever thought that it has nothing to do with the distances or the expenditure? That we can’t sell out these events because the more you have the more they devalue each other?
So when IMG and/or the clubs are deciding what to do with Magic perhaps the first question they should be asking is who or what is it for? And is that enough to persist with it?
Saints; Welsby, Makinson, Hurrell, Percival, Ritson, Lomax, Dodd, Walmsley, Roby, Lees, Sironen, Batchelor, Bell. Interchanges: Mata’utia, Lussick, Paasi, McCarthy-Scarsbrook
Giants;
Lolohea, Bibby, Naiqama, Marsters, Senior, Fages, Connor, Hill, Peats, English, Cudjoe, McQueen, Yates. Interchanges: Milner, Greenwood, Rushton, Ikahihifo
Referee: Marcus Griffiths
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