The Story Of 2023
Four consecutive Grand Final wins is unprecedented in the Super League era. A fifth would have elevated Saints into a whole new realm of greatness. In the end they fell short in Paul Wellens’ debut season as Head Coach. They were chopped down in the final throes of a semi-final against Catalans Dragons in Perpignan. Ousted by Sam Tomkins’ final act as a professional rugby league player.
But let’s rewind to happier times. Victory over Leeds in the 2022 Grand Final had earned Saints a shot at the World Club Challenge. Boldly, Saints agreed to go into the home of the then back-to-back (now threepeating) Penrith Panthers. It was a task which dominated the early part of the season and - when you consider that Saints finished level on points with both Wigan and the Dragons at the end of the regular season - arguably contributed to the end of their domestic reign.
A place in the top two would have meant a week off and a home semi-final. Instead Wellens’s side were forced to play an extra playoff round against mild irritants Warrington before the hop across the channel to face Steve McNamara’s side in the last four.
Whether it was worth it depends very much on where you rank victory in the World Club Challenge among the game’s honours. Saints warmed up for the Panthers clash with a 30-18 friendly win over the other Dragons of St George-Illawarra. Then, as the other Super League clubs opened their league campaigns Saints took on the Panthers - Stephen Crichton, Brian To’o, Jarome Luai, Nathan Cleary et al - in torrential rain.
It turned out to be a glorious night. Tries by Jack Welsby and Konrad Hurrell were added to by goals from Tommy Makinson and Mark Percival. To’o and Izak Tago crossed for the Australians before a Lewis Dodd drop-goal sealed Saints’ third world title. A first since 2007. Wellens had only coached one competitive game and he was already a world champion. Just as he had been as a player in wins against Brisbane Broncos in 2001 and 2007. His first season in charge would not get any better than the events of that night at Panthers’ Blue Bet Stadium.
The physical and emotional effects of the World Club Challenge were not immediately obvious when the Super League campaign got under way at Castleford a week later. A 24-6 win was memorable only for Bureta Fairamo’s hilarious butchering of a late consolation try when he put his arm in touch as he grounded the ball with the Saints defenders not much closer to him than they had been when they were in Sydney.
Things started to get a little more awkward as we moved into March. Saints suffered back-to-back defeats, going down by a single point at home to Leeds thanks to a late Blake Austin drop-goal and then at Leigh where early dominance couldn’t prevent a 20-12 loss. They got back on track when they beat Hull FC at home by the same score. Huddersfield were edged out 14-12 at the John Smith’s Stadium before a seven-try, 38-0 battering of Wakefield Trinity made it three league wins in a row.
The Good Friday visit to Wigan was another big test. Only this time Saints didn’t quite pass it, going down 14-6 after a slow start saw them trailing 8-0 at the break. A 26-14 loss at Hull KR followed. After eight rounds of Super League the newly crowned world champions had a rather modest record of four wins and four losses. That became five wins and five losses as victory over Warrington was followed by a 24-12 reverse to the Dragons in Perpignan.
Some consistency was required and - right on cue - the defending champions found it. Salford were seen off at home before that one-point loss to Leeds was avenged by the same margin at Headingley. This time it was Dodd slotting the winning point in a 13-12 victory, just as he had done against the Panthers. The Giants then came to town and were routed 48-6 before Wigan turned up for the second derby of the season. Try doubles from Welsby and Makinson helped Saints record an impressive 34-6 victory. By now we were in June and it felt at last like Wellens’ men were properly in the race after that rocky start to the domestic programme.
Even a 34-6 loss at Hull didn’t spoil the mood. It had come just days after a Challenge Cup quarter-final between the two, an exertion which had persuaded Wellens to leave James Roby on the bench. Morgan Knowles played at hooker. Makinson and Percival were also missing.
A 22-0 home stroll over the Tigers got things back on track as June ended. July began with a 24-20 win at Warrington before the second of what would ultimately be three defeats at the home of the Dragons. This time Saints went down 14-12 with Adam Keighran’s boot proving the difference.
Saints had been making steady progress in the Challenge Cup. That last eight win over FC had followed a sixth round defeat of Halifax Panthers. Next up in the semi-final was a Leigh side which had bucked the trend among promoted sides and actually been competitive in league and cup. The newly branded Leopards would go on to make the playoffs and - after edging out Saints 12-10 - win the cup for the first time in 52 years. Saints could feel aggrieved at how Tom Briscoe had manhandled Tee Ritson in the build-up to Zak Hardaker’s crucial try, and also at losing both Alex Walmsley and Agnatius Paasi for long spells thanks to John Asiata’s revolutionary, armless, head-first tackling, but the result was in the papers as they say. It was the Grand Final or bust now,
So serious were Saints about their one remaining mission that they did not lose another regular season game in 2023. They reeled off nine wins on the spin as all of Leeds, Salford, Huddersfield, Hull KR, Castleford, Wakefield, Leigh, Warrington and Hull FC tried and failed to stop the late season juggernaut. Yet as impressive as it was the winning run was not quite good enough either to win the League Leaders Shield or to get into the top two for that home semi-final. Instead there was another trip to Perpignan and that last nasty surprise from the bottom of Tomkins’ fading reserves.
The 2024 Recruits
It’s hardly a spoiler to point out that Roby has gone but we’ll discuss that in more detail later. For now all we need to know is that Saints needed a hooker. That hasn’t been true very often in the summer era. In 28 years since the launch of Super League the job has been carried out by just two men. Two sporting behemoths to be more accurate. Roby’s 20-year career in the role overlapped the 17-year stint of Keiron Cunningham. It was always asking a little too much for the club’s youth system to produce a third. It was time to go to market.
Wellens went forth and came back with Daryl Clark. The 31 year-old leaves Warrington after almost a decade and seems completely unfazed by the challenge of following on from two of the greatest of all-time. Ten times an England international, Clark is just about as good a replacement as you could hope for short of kidnapping Harry Grant or Damien Cook.
Playing for Warrington for so long it is no surprise that Clark has lost a Grand Final or two in his time. To be fair he was on the winning side when Wire beat Saints at Wembley in the 2019 Challenge Cup final. But that fact doesn’t lead me in quite as well to the arrival of Matt Whitley who had also been on the losing side twice at Old Trafford. And besides I think we’d all quite like to forget about it.
A back rower, Whitley is a local lad despite having played the last five seasons in France with the Dragons after starting his career with Widnes. Whether Saints needed another second rower when they already have Sione Mata’utia, Joe Batchelor, Curtis Sironen, James Bell and Knowles is doubtful. However there is some chat about Mata’utia moving up to prop in the continuing absence of the unfortunate Paasi which makes rather more sense.
That’s the pack bolstered then, what about the backs? The glaring weakness in the team last year was the attack and more specifically a debilitating lack of pace. Ritson turned out to be Championship fast rather than actually fast, while for all his qualities Jon Bennison doesn’t look like a player whose final destination will be the three-quarters. Makinson is still a prolific scorer - he scored 22 tries and 29 goals in the league last term - and still arguably the best all around winger in the competition. But he has taken more than his fair share of physical punishment with the way Saints have used him as a battering ram over the years. At 32, he must feel more like 42 some days. There has been talk of him choosing to wind down his great career in the French sunshine from next year and you wouldn’t blame him.
He remains for now but help was still required. To that end in comes Waqa Blake (pronounced Wonga) from the Parramatta Eels. Blake can play anywhere along the three-quarter line and is a veteran of 165 NRL appearances with the Eels and prior to that Penrith Panthers. The Fijian has represented his country five times. If he can be as successful as the last Fijian international centre to wear the red vee then we’re in for a treat. Kevin Naiqama played three seasons for Saints between 2019-21 and was a Grand Final winner in all of them.
The one nagging doubt about Blake is the fact that he has only agreed a one-year deal. The suspicion is that this is either because he is hoping to impress enough during that time to earn a deal back in the NRL for 2025 and beyond or because Saints have other plans for the centre position from that time. If Jamie Lyon wasn’t 42 there would be someone on Facebook insisting that he is coming back to wear the red vee again.
So Who’s Out?
Did I mention that Roby has retired? After 20 seasons and a club record 551 appearances the 38 year-old finally bows out. He does so with 20 major honours to his name. Twice a world champion - and how fitting that he would end his playing days with that title - Roby has also won four Challenge Cup winners medals and and six Super League Grand Final rings. You can throw in eight League Leaders Shield successes too. Nobody has made more Super League appearances, a landmark he passed in June 2022. He also has 32 caps for England and 7 for Great Britain. It’s been quite the career.
Two other members of Saints’ 2023 class have also called time on their playing careers. Louie McCarthy-Scarsbrook spent 13 seasons at the club, making 372 appearances. That came after turning out almost 100 times for London. Or Harlequins as they were known then. McCarthy-Scarsbrook’s medal collection includes five Super League Grand Final wins, a Challenge Cup, a World Club Challenge and four League Leaders Shield triumphs. He has represented both England and Ireland at international level.
Will Hopoate has been around for a much shorter time. The Tongan spent only the final two seasons of his career at Saints. Before that he made over 180 appearances in the NRL for Manly, Parramatta and Canterbury. It is fair to say he divided opinion during his time with Saints. Persistent injury problems restricted him to 31 appearances in his two campaigns. Yet he still leaves with a Super League Grand Final ring having played in the 2022 win over Leeds and he was part of the side that beat the Panthers at the start of 2023. If Hopoate was available then Wellens tended to select him for the very biggest games, which tells you something about how the Head Coach regarded him.
Of those moving on with their playing careers at new clubs prop Dan Norman seems the most significant. He has joined Leigh after three seasons with Saints in which he could only manage 21 appearances. He was thrown in for a debut by Kristian Woolf in the 2021 Challenge Cup semi-final against Hull FC but that was the biggest game he was involved in during his stay. He did not feature in either the 2021 Challenge Cup final win over Castleford, that year’s Grand Final win over Catalans, the Old Trafford success against Leeds in 2022 or the World Club Challenge in what turned out to be his final season.
Even with McCarthy-Scarsbrook’s retirement the emergence of George Delaney and the buzz around Noah Stephens have rendered Norman surplus to requirements.
Joining Norman at Leigh will be back rower Lewis Baxter, while Jumah Sambou, Taylor Pembeton and Matty Foster join Oldham, York and Salford respectively. The trio have made only four first team appearances between them. Daniels Moss and Hill played twice each. Moss has been trialling at Bradford while Hill was released.
Finally, centre Wesley Bruines moves to Warrington without ever taking to the field in a Saints jersey. He was a non-playing substitute in a 28-6 win over the Wolves in April of last year and now has the opportunity to see if he can make an impact under new Wire Head Coach Sam Burgess.
What’s The Expectation?
It’s always high for Saints, but perhaps it’s a smidgeon less lofty than it was during the Woolf years. Still, it’s a big year for Wellens who will be expected to at least continue the club’s proud record of playing in every playoff series since they were reintroduced in 1998. Even that might not be good enough bearing in mind what happened to Cunningham after two Super League semi-finals and a Challenge Cup semi-final in his two full seasons in charge. And he had a much weaker squad than the one at Wellens’ disposal. Irrespective of the available personnel the Saints Head Coach’s job description in the professional era has always been to win.
What Will Really Happen?
Saints will make the playoffs. See, even I’m doing it now and I’m supposed to be objective. Raising expectations, I mean. If there are any doubts among my fellow Saints faithful they have often been around the recruitment done by Wigan. The other lot wrestled the Super League crown back from us in 2023 but aren’t standing around with their fingers up their collective bum admiring their achievement.
They have brought in former Saints Grand Final winning prop Luke Thompson from Canterbury, hot front row prospect Sam Walters from Leeds, ex-Rhinos hooker Kruise Leeming and Dragons goal-kicking centre Keighran among others. And they’ve persuaded Warrington to take Toby King back. Matty Peat’s side are looking as strong as they have since before Saints began their four-in-a-row dynasty.
But flash signings aren’t always a guarantee of success. We’ve all had our Josh Perry moments. And in any case you can only worry about yourself and not place too much focus on your rivals. With that in mind my main issue with the Saints class of 2024 is the age profile of the squad, All of Makinson, Walmsley, Jonny Lomax, Hurrell, Clark, Curtis Sironen, Moses Mbye, Bell and Paasi are the wrong side of 30. Percival, Batchelor and Blake will all turn 30 in 2024.
The flip side of that argument is that it gives Saints more experience than most. And it’s extremely valuable experience with all of those listed except Mbye having played in and won major finals with the club. Mbye has played in an NRL Grand Final, albeit a losing one with Canterbury as long ago as 2014. He also played all three games for Queensland in the 2019 State Of Origin series.
Mix all of that experience with the more youthful Dodd, Delaney and Welsby and it could just work. Welsby’s decision to sign a deal with Saints until the end of 2027 is a major plus. He is already the best player in Super League and is about to enter his best years.
Wellens’ two main areas of concern beyond that should be improving the attack with the limited injection of pace brought in via Blake, and sorting out a woeful disciplinary record. Hardly a week seemed to go by in 2023 without one or more of Saints’ key players serving another wholly avoidable suspension. It can’t possibly be all Paul Cullen’s fault or that of THe rFL. At some point you have to take responsibility and it’s Wellens’ job to lead that.
Given that Saints will make the playoffs then logically they are a genuine contender to win it all again for a fifth time in six seasons. Leeds have shown on numerous occasions that this system can reward you without the need to be the most consistent side throughout the year.
Saints probably won’t be that but nobody will want to face them in October.