“This is the last play. Long kicks it wide to Iro… Iro to Hall… Hall is trapped. Back it goes to Hoppe… over the shoulder to Hall… there is Jonkers. Here is Long… and Long fancies it… Long fancies it. It’s wide to West…it’s wide to West… Dwayne West… inside to Joynt, Joynt, Joynt, Joynt!”
So said former Sky Sports commentator and one time voice of rugby league Eddie Hemmings 25 years ago as Saints - trailing 11-10 to Matthew Elliott’s powerful Bradford Bulls outfit - produced a last play miracle which saw Dwayne West pass into folklore. The club website called it ‘rugby league’s greatest ever try’. Nothing like that could ever happen again. Could it?
We’ll get to that.
An Unlikely Story
There were moments this season when this column expressed serious doubts that Saints would even make the playoffs. Paul Wellens’ side started the month of May with a dismal Magic Weekend defeat to Leeds Rhinos. It was their third in a row after losses to Wigan and Warrington.
If the latter hadn’t completely imploded around the same time - winning only one in 7 between early May and early July - the red vee could have missed out for the first time in the Super League era.
Even when we sneaked into the knockout games by finishing sixth in the regular season there was little enthusiasm among the fans. Saints are as boring to watch as they are unlikely to win the big games. This year’s top three are Hull KR, Wigan and Leigh. Saints haven’t beaten any of them for almost 18 months. Only those who enjoy attending the Grand Final as a neutral were booking their tickets for Old Trafford.
And Yet…Hope
The one sliver of hope was in being paired with the Rhinos. Brad Arthur’s much improved side had finished third in the table but had a poor record against Saints. That Magic win was their only one in four previous attempts.
Their Challenge Cup ambitions were ended by Saints while in the league Wellens’ side prevailed 18-4 at home in June and 6-0 in West Yorkshire a month later.
Saints hadn’t quite finished torturing them. Trailing 14-12 after treating us to 80 more minutes of desperate, turgid attack they were awarded a penalty. Jarrod O’Connor had picked the ball up from an offside position after Mark Percival’s attempted offload had been touched by Brodie Croft. Seconds remained before the hooter sounded. One last play. One last chance to extend an hitherto underwhelming season.
The New Wide To West
Jonny Lomax kicked it out of play to get Saints started 30 metres out. Daryl Clark hit Lomax who moved it on to Welsby. He went right to Tristan Sailor. Finding little room in front of him the Australian fullback sent it back to Welsby. He went left to Lomax who drew Croft and found our story’s hero Shane Wright.
Wright had James McDonnell, Ryan Hall and Croft in his path so dished it back inside to Welsby. He produced a looping, rather hopeful effort which just eluded Alex Walmsley before bouncing into the arms of Matt Whitley. He found an offload to Sailor who shifted it quickly on to Harry Robertson. Are you keeping up?
Robertson didn’t pass. Not straight away at any rate. Jinking inside Ash Handley and then arcing around the increasingly desperate Leeds defenders. Half the Rhinos team had a shot at the young star but none of them could get a firm grip on him until he was less than 10 metres from the line.
At which point he brought out a one handed offload to Sailor. Much criticised in his first season with Saints, Sailor might have elevated his status with the fans with what followed. He produced an other worldly, flicked offload which travelled nearly 30 metres in from touch. It found Whitley who with his second involvement in this dizzying finale found Lomax.
Suddenly there was all sorts of space. Most of the Leeds team - who were on the right side of the field as Saints had attacked through Robertson - were taken out by Sailor’s piece of genius. By the time Lomax got it from Whitley there was a serious lack of defensive cover in blue and amber. From there it went left, through the hands to James Bell, Welsby and then Wright.
Wright was playing only his second game for Saints having joined on an initial loan from Salford. Yet here he was about to join West in the pantheon of…not greats but certainly unforgettables. He could have passed it to Percival or his former Red Devils teammate Deon Cross. Instead he backed himself as he charged between Harry Newman and Lachie Miller to score the most memorable and incredibly unlikely of tries. Pandemonium inside Headingley and no doubt throughout the pubs in St Helens.
The Welloball Paradox
It has to be the biggest irony of this or any other season that Saints win a game of this magnitude this way. They have spent the best part of three seasons locked up in Wellens’ straight jacket. Yet by the end of that one bewitching sequence they were not only free but indulging themselves in free jazz.
Of course necessity is the mother of invention. There was no time left on the clock and no choice but to keep the ball alive. By hook or by crook. That they found a way is a glimpse into their capabilities. They could play a much more entertaining brand of rugby but are constantly coached out of it. Not only by Wellens but by the dull perceived wisdom of the modern game. Complete your sets. Get in the grind. Stay in the arm wrestle. This was glorious anathema to all of that.
Before The Chaos
Now, if we’ve all calmed down I’m afraid I’m still duty bound to reflect on what took place in the previous 80 minutes. Before Newman’s Tears and what former Saint turned Sky Sports pundit Jon Wilkin seems to have been credited with dubbing ‘Left To Wright’. He can have that one. It’s clunkingly obvious. If you’re a Saints fan witnessing the rest of this game and several others like it this season you might prefer the moniker’Shite To Wright’. I think that sums up the journey nicely.
After weeks of immovability at halfback Moses Mbye was finally asked to do something different. Namely hit the bench and wait for the call to go in at hooker to give Clark a rest. Lomax assumed halfback responsibilities with Welsby named as the stand-off. The loss of Kyle Feldt due to back spasms meant that Jon Bennison came in on the wing. You didn’t see his name in the credits of that epic Wright try earlier but the departing 22 year-old would play a crucial role in the drama.
The absence of Agnatius Paasi through injury was not the setback it once may have been. However it was a body that needed replacing in the front row rotation. Not only that, Matty Lees was expecting his wife to give birth at any time. It was a risk to play him knowing that he may have to leave. Which he did as it turned out.
But the greater error by Wellens here was surely in leaving out Noah Stephens. The young prop should be in the 17 before Passi as it is. It is inexplicable that he was selected as 18th man, therefore only available in the event of concussions. When Lees left Saints’ only recognised props were Walmsley and George Delaney. Morgan Knowles would do a fine job there but then who do you play at 13? The best option was clearly to include Stephens.
It seems churlish to complain. In many ways that epic denouement renders everything else irrelevant. If it’s about winning and providing excitement you can give Wellens and his team two great big ticks. Yet before that glorious finale the tweaks in the halfback role had achieved little.
Ball movement was slow. And rare in any case. Plays were predictable and comfortable to defend. The kicking game ranged from the shambolic to the farcical. One toweringly obvious boot to the skies by Welsby did lead to the try that got Saints back in the game following Chris Hankinson’s opening score for the Rhinos.
Curtis Sironen got to it before Ryan Hall as it came down. The ex-Manly man tried to offload to the supporting Knowles who could only get a hand to it. As it dropped towards the ground and we all prepared another horrified groan Knowles just managed to get a foot to it before it hit the deck. Lomax is still wily if no longer flexible and he knew that an opportunity was on as it rolled into the Leeds in-goal area. Knowles was also in pursuit but it was the skipper who touched down, confirmed by video referee Chris Kendall.
A Big Statement - Who Benefits?
So who doesn’t love an RFL statement? The unlikeliness of this win is further illustrated by the governing body scribbling some words in crayon about how Bennison’s try - which came just five minutes earlier than the epic winner - should not have stood. The winger had stepped inside his man from Sailor’s pass and reached out to touch down with Leeds defenders clinging on to him.
From the angles available to Kendall it looked for all the world like Bennison had reached the line. However there is another angle - made available later - which appeared to show that the ball had been grounded short. On a night of improbable events Saints may have dodged a bullet.
But they aren’t the first to do so. How often do we hear statements from the governing body telling us about other officiating errors? Leeds fans will just be further irritated by it, we don’t care because we won and it only fuels the prevailing culture of ref bashing.
One More Step
Hull KR await in the semi-finals. The narrative around Wellens earning a new contract on the back of reaching the last four is for another day. Saints are huge underdogs against the League Leaders’ Shield winners. Three attempts to beat them in 2025 have led to nothing but soul searching.
Saints were saved at Headingley by madness and chaos. Maybe it’s time to stop fearing them.
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