Not enjoyable to watch that at all but there were some positives.

Hankinson looks natural in the centre and not out of place at that level. Only one game and got skinned by Makinson but overall a decent debut.
Tomkins was flawless.
Davies ran his blood to water
Some decent hits in defence

I have no issues with the effort, we just lacked guile and creativity again. To hold Saints to 2 tries was a good effort all things considered.one try from a daft mistake and one from a straight forward missed one to one tackle by Powell. No excuses but we can’t ignore the circumstances. Lockers, Williams, Gildart, Burgess, Sutton all missing and a lad making his debut after signing from Swinton 48 hours ago.

Whoever comes in just has to prioritise a 7.

Saints were missing their two most potent strike players in Barba & Percival heaven knows what the score would have been had they played,
I agree about a new No7 though

Taia and Walmsley too.

Quite possibly one of the most low-key derbies I’ve seen in a good few years. Saints looked dangerous throughout) ripping us apart at times. Only our scrambling defence keeping it a lower score. We ‘came alive’ with ten minutes to go and too much to do.
That probably sums it up!

Yea I know. I think choosing to rest players because you’re so far ahead and replacing them with natural cover is slightly different to our circumstances though. Sarginson hasn’t played much at all all season and had his 1st game back. Hankinson was a Swinton player 2 days ago. Burgess and Gildart are 2 of our fastest players, Lockers is Lockers, Williams & Sutton missing. Clubband Powell both haven’t trained all week with tight hamstrings, Bateman was touch and go with his groun although you’d never know!

I just think a balanced view and some context makes this loss slightly less painful. Only slightly!! We’re desperate for some fresh ideas with the ball.

You forgot Farrell

Defense was ok - but attack wise , awful. Too predictable and way too slow - the passes along the line were taking an age and most of the time were the "here you have" it type with no purpose other than to get rid. I pity our wingers - just driving the ball up from kicks and never getting any decent passes all game. Might as well play forwards there! And the less said about our kicking game the better.

Keep playing like that and our season will be ending very soon into the play-offs.

The problem with games like is where are the scores actually going to come from?

A brave effort in defence, all the more praiseworthy given the absentees, was no consolation for a non-existent attack.

Sam's try was a great individual effort against a defence that was finally flagging. Aside from that, we never looked like scoring ... and that's not even taking into account the several sets near the line that we casually fluffed with unforced errors on the first or second play (Again).

We did have injuries, yes, but two of our three 'first choice' pivots were on, and yet they offered less than nothing in attack. Ordinarily, I'd say that George Williams would be a big loss, but let's not kid ourselves. For whatever reason, there've been several games this season where he's been no more than a passenger. So I doubt that he'd have done anything.

However we reorganise our playing personnel when Wane has gone, we need to find some halfbacks who can distribute the ball, open gaps and kick into space.

Good grief ... how many sets ended with us lazily turning over possession by just lobbing the ball a third of the way down the field and trundling up in slow pursuit? No testing of the opposition, no pressure, no territory or advantage gained of any sort. It was total amateur night.

For the criticism George Williams receives since his injury we have seen how much difference he makes. Before his injury he had the most try assists for a half back in the league. Woods/Powell are about as average as 2 SL half backs could be. We need Williams and a good 7 for next year at the very minimum for recruitment

If it was down to me, I certainly would not get rid of George, because, as you say, his seemingly endless poor form is only a small part of the problem.

When he is off, we basically have NO halves.

Last night illustrated that perfectly.

GEORGE EVEN COPS IT WHEN HE'S NOT PLAYING MOST COACHES IN SL WOULD WECOME HIM TO THERE SQUADS GET REAL

Everyone thought St Helens' squad was bang average before Holbrook came in.

Im pretty certain we will look a very good side with two signatures from a quality scrum half and coach.

I'm not sure what our halves were supposed to be able to do last night given how we played. Just look at the difference in the number of carries between their props and ours. Amor made 19 carries, Thompson 17. For us Flower and Tautai made around 7. Navarrete only 4. On the other hand Bateman made 26 and Isa/Greenwood both made more than 10 carries simply by playing half the game out wide.

The ball was being driven up the middle by our outside backs (Davies and Sarginson predominantly). That's all well and good but it's not going to tire the Saints pack or trouble them too much. Then we just chucked the ball from left to right and back again with little purpose or direction. All the Saints defence had to do was keep sliding across one way then the other. They barely had to worry about our props making a carry never mind a strong one. No one was drawing defenders down the middle because we weren't using our props to drive the ball in well enough.

In the second half Flower came off the bench, made some very strong carries down the middle that troubled the Saints defence and we looked more threatening. But it was too little too late.

Our tactics were basically to let our outside backs and second row run at them a lot.

Saints made 9 clean breaks compared to our 1. If they'd been a bit more clinical, or had Barba and Percival in the side, they'd have taken those chances. The scoreline flattered us

Ya lads did well last night didn't they!!!!

If I were a Stain's fan I would be rather miffed at that result, just look at the squad numbers that Wigan had out on the park v's Saints.

We shouldn't see numbers 39,40 and a new shiny 41 on the pitch at the same time in an ideal world.

To have only managed to get over the line twice really doesn't say a lot for Saints.

They scored one from our stupid mistake and one from a straight forward one on one missed tackle. That said they looked far more dangerous that we ever did and we never looked like scoring.

You were right, it did!

I was actually pleased with the effort last night, a respectable score line which had the potential to be a blow out against a classy Saints side which are unrecognisable from when Cunningham was coach.

That’s because Saints had 4 out of 6 strike players missing, those 4 have scored 50% of our tries so far this season.

Goons got off lightly with Saints dominating the line breaks at 9 to 1.

Who were the 4 strike players you had missing? Barba and Percival but who else?

Taia and Walmsley.

Oh look, he’s back!! Thank god for than we’ve missed you Jud!

So in the Ben Flower final did Saints get off lightly when we made more line breaks that Saints despite having 12 men for 78 minutes? No because you don’t get points for breaking the line u clown, you get points for scoring tries and u got 2 of them to our 1. Incidentally you were without Barba Taia, Walmesley and Percy, we were without Gildart Burgess, Williams, Farrell, Sutton and O’Loughlin. It’s not about who was missing, it’s about who plays and your 17 were better than ours. Thanks for coming back now please do us all a favour and stay away with you big floppy shoes and your red nose if you don’t want to contribute to a sensible, meaningful discussion.

Speaking of which, I've no idea why he gets booed by Saints fans.

He single handedly won them a Grand Final. He should be a club legend.

Haha.. Not so much strike players as just players then?

And lockers

(Plus Manfredi)

Lockers is listed mate but missed off Manfredi and Faz! My bad!!