Spot on G1 saints were always going to throw everything at us in those 20 minutes after half time we weathered the storm stopped making mistakes and got back into it. Thought RB did fine as usual, very hard to pick a mom so many did good stints , delaney showing a bit more form but Stevie Ward was again very very impressive if he keeps it up he should be a shoe in for England. I have been a bit unsure about Aiton but the fella is proving me wrong he was great and shores up the middle very well.

Just a mention for the coach he deserves big plaudits for his tactical game plan

I agree with this. Sutcliffe got smashed too by Turner off a dreadful hospital pass from someone (think Ablett??) and there was several other good strong hits by Saints in the 2nd that shouldn't be ignored as to why we didn't enjoy the same success in the 2nd half rather than throw too much blame at Burrow.



Had Walsh started the game would we have enjoyed such a strong 1st half......not imo.



Had Walsh not been available would Saints have come back into in the 2nd half.....not imo.



Had we kept Aiton on and left Burrow on the bench would Saints still have come back at us in that 2nd half.....yes imo.



Watch it back and errors kept into our play, Hardaker lost the ball (looked like a steal) and knocked on a high kick that put us under the cosh and all around I think we just tried to play the same way as the 1st half, but a step up from Saints didn't allow those keep the ball alive passes to work. Like you mention Aiton was on a while before we scored through Sutcliffe to kill it off and Saints heads dropped for the remainder.....and it wasn't because we suddenly improved play, it was either Cutbertson or Peacock who threw a speculator of an offload and Sinfield fortunately gets a toe to it and manages to scramble a pass away to Sutcliffe who skips through to score....so it wasn't on the back of some shifting of balance thanks to Aiton for Burrow at all.

With Watkins out of position and no Briscoe our right was the obvious place to attack. Saints were always going to have a period where they had some possession in the right part of the field to do that. What we did very well for most if the game was control the middle and we had very good and mobile defence on the edge - Aiton, Singleton, Ward and even JP made huge efforts to stop the ball moving quickly wide. We shut down a lot if Saints lateral ball movement by defending the edge of the middle zone energetically.

I guess you might argue that Aiton coming off made us slightly less effective at that, but we also for done parts of the second half had Singleton and Ward off.

I prefer hookers to be genuine forwards and defend close to the ruck, I'd also prefer Rob Burrow to not have to play hooker, but 7. However, he's just too good (still) to not be in the 17, so I guess this is the best working option.



I think Saints will get better with Walsh getting up to speed. They have a more powerful pack than for some years. It's their outside backs that look average, Lomax could help but otherwise they look very beige.

What most people have said,Saints were embarrassing in the first half as good as we were and a renewed effort and Walsh on the pitch was always going to mean we would be up against it for a period but we came through it and finished the game well.



As an aside i was very impressed with Jon Wilkins post game interview.He paid full credit to us for the job we did on them and also fully appreciated he wasnt a half back and was just trying his best to help out through the injuries and was exposed.Saints will certainly pick up with Walsh back in.

I think while Walmsley had a poor game by his usual standards, his stats for the year definitely justify him playing for England.



1699 metres compared to Cuthbertsons 1233, average gain of 7.58m compared to Cuthbertson's 5.84m, and 47 tackle busts compared to Cuthbertson's 19. Cuthbertson has made 348 tackles compared to Walmsley's 273, made 53 offloads to Walmsley's 29. Cuthbertson has made 9 errors compared to Walmsley's 14, but then gave away 7 penalties to Walmsley's 4. Cuthbertson has also missed 29 tackles compared to Walmsley's 24 (though this is probably due to making more tackles)



The two of them along with James Graham, George Burgess and Chris Hill would be a very strong prop rotation for England!



Really impressed with Sutcliffe on Friday, looks like your replacement for Sinfield is already sorted. His vision and decision making for his age is very impressive. If you manage to sign Widdop too your backline will be ridiculous.

Singleton, I think?



Horrible, looping pass when we were playing Harlem Globetrotters in the second half.

Indeed. I thought he did very well to keep his focus on holding the ball. Utterly defenceless against the hit, which arrived at pretty much the same time as the ball did.



It was a nice hit though. Shows that you can smash an opponent without resorting to shoulder charges.

Mose Mosoe's game stats make very interesting reading.

Ian Kirke would be proud of those stats

One small incident that made Sutcliffe stand out as a class act was how he took the pass for his try. It was a poor pass that he stuck out his right hand for & just let the ball float onto to it without seemingly watching the ball; no desperate grabbing, no change in cadence.

Then again, look at Mitch Achurch.

In his first stint, he didn't touch the ball. neither did any saints player either!