Report: Warrington 10-21 St Helens

It was yet more heartache against St Helens on Friday night for the Wire, as a late flurry of points for the league leaders earned them a narrow win in an outstanding game of rugby league.
As expected, Tom Lineham returned to the team following his three-game suspension. He took the place of Jack Johnson, while Sitaleki Akauola came in for his first start of the season, starting at loose forward in place of Joe Philbin, who was on the bench. It was a bench that didn't contain Ben Murdoch-Masila, who has picked up an injury that will keep him out for a few weeks. In Murdoch-Masila's place was Lama Tasi, appearing for the first time in exactly two months. There was no place in the matchday squad for Luther Burrell, who will have to wait for his rugby league debut, though the union convert was at the HJ and involved in the pre-match warm-up. The atmosphere was building brilliantly before kick-off, with a bumper crowd of 14,211 getting the noise going from the off.

Wire made a great start to the game with Jake Mamo making a brilliant break in the first set, a set which nearly yielded a try. From the following Saints set, Wire's defence was terrific, keeping them right in their own half with a series of great tackles that drove the opposition back. A huge hit on Aaron Smith from Akauola left Smith injured and the young hooker had to leave the field after just three minutes. Those opening three minutes superbly set the tone for the night, full of Wire discipline, intensity and passion. Smith's injury brought about a break of eight minutes, but when play resumed the momentum carried the way of the home side, with a grubber kick from Josh Charnley being batted away by Theo Fages for a drop-out. Unfortunately, a poor kick from Declan Patton on the fifth play gave Saints the initiative, with a break from James Bentley. 

A brilliant ball from Saints' star man Lachlan Coote found Regan Grace out wide, and the Welsh winger crossed the whitewash and looked to have scored the game's first try after eight minutes, though the review from the video referee confirmed that strong defence from Josh Charnley forced Grace into touch before he got the ball down. Another poor kick from Patton allowed Coote to break, but a good tackle from Jack Hughes prevented him from getting too far. After fifteen minutes, Bentley conceded a penalty by not being square and Wire elected to take the two points on offer. Patton kicked the goal from 30 metres for a 2-0 lead, then just two minutes later that lead became 4-0 when Saints conceded a penalty for obstruction and the team again decided to take two points, a decision I questioned at the time - what's the difference between 2-0 and 4-0? Charnley sent Grace into touch again with more strong defence, though Saints were looking more threatening as the half went on. Wire's last plays were poor and Saints were forcing repeat sets, and looked to have their reward when Matty Lees crossed for a try, but Ben Thaler ruled a knock-on. Solid defence from Steve Price's men meant that Saints went into half-time scoreless, with just four points on the board from two Patton penalties.

The second period started with the same relentless intensity but more errors and penalties from both sides with no clear-cut chances carved in the first ten minutes. Thaler awarded Warrington a penalty 12 minutes into the second-half for an incorrect play-the-ball and once again the choice was taken to go for the two points, just ten metres out. Should we have been a bit more ambitious there? Anyway, the lead was 6-0 with half an hour to play. Jack Hughes was then sent to the sin bin for a shoulder charge on Tommy Makinson, in a moment of poor discipline at a crucial time from the co-captain. This was a game-changing moment. Wire saw out the first seven minutes with twelve men but a brilliant break from the influential Jonny Lomax, who eased through a shocking tackle attempt from the ever-wondrous Lama Tasi, was only stopped by a superb recovery tackle from Toby King. Coote then found Fages, and the former Salford halfback played a clearly forward pass to Mark Percival, who crossed for a try. Somehow the touch judge didn't call for a forward pass which was unbelievably blatant and left the HJ crowd furious. Coote converted for 6-6 and a level game.

Warrington responded well and were back up to the full complement of players. A knock-on from Alex Walmsley, who was superb for Saints, gave Wire a scrum on Saints' own 40 metre line and a brilliant chance to edge back in front. Remarkably, Patton decided to kick on the second tackle of the six, and only found the feet of Tommy Makinson, who had no trouble taking it under control. This was a massive chance and surely one of the major wasted opportunities of the game. Four tackles left in the bag, Saints under pressure and we go and hand possession right back on the second play? Flaming hell Dec. Decision-making was again questionable when with ten minutes left and the scores level, we opted to kick for the corner rather than go for a drop-goal, more poor game management. The game was lost in the next set. A high boot from Lomax at dummy-half was chased down by Lomax himself, who barged into Jake Mamo and forced the error from the full back, who had been brilliant until that point. Mamo had the ball knocked out of him by Lomax and Luke Thompson beat Charnley and King to score a try. Coote added the extras - though from the East Stand it looked like he had missed - and the score was 6-12 in favour of Justin Holbrook's team. A drop-goal from Coote in the resulting set made it 6-13 with five minutes left and it looked all over.

The drama wasn't finished there though. Blake Austin went for a short kick-off, and pantomime villain Louie McCarthy-Scarsbrook batted it back, but Mamo won the ball and set away with his brilliant pace, rounded Regan Grace and scored a brilliant try to narrow the gap to three points and make it game on with five minutes to go. Patton was faced with a simple conversion but in his hurry to get the ball back and get the game restarted, took his eyes off the task in hand and missed the kick, meaning that rather than 12-13 and needing a drop-goal, it was 10-13 and Wire needed another try. With five minutes left it was just about doable, but Joe Philbin knocked on with the first play of the next set, awarding Saints possession. The brilliant Walmsley beat the challenges of Ben Currie and Chris Hill to score with three minutes left and secure the game. Coote kicked the conversion for a nine-point advantage and then kicked another penalty right on the hooter to extend the winning margin to eleven points, a margin which is highly unreflective of the match.

This was a brilliant performance and one to be proud of. Not many teams have matched St Helens for periods in matches and we did for 70 minutes, keeping them scoreless for the first hour. Our defence was top-notch for the most part, but discipline let us down again. Too many silly penalties in the second-half hurt us, but the biggest factor is surely the sin binning of Jack Hughes - atrocious discipline from a co-captain. That, combined with some absolutely terrible officiating to fail to spot the forward pass for Percival's try were major factors in the match. In terms of what we can do better, I thought our game management was poor and a bit too negative. I agreed with the decision to take the two points in the first instance, but for the second and third penalties we had Saints under pressure and really should've backed ourselves to score a try in at least one of those sets. I also think our general play was too defensive, we needed more unpredictable and risky play - the attacking side of our game was fairly toothless - we didn't carve any of our own opportunities. And WHY didn't we set up for a drop goal at 6-6? Still, there's nothing you can do if referees and touch judges won't notice a clearly forward pass. Horrid. 

There's plenty to be positive about there. One of the best performances of the season full of passion, desire and energy. Daryl Clark and Jake Mamo were the stars, while the defensive shifts of Josh Charnley and Tom Lineham were brilliant. Sitaleki Akauola and Chris Hill did very well, as did Toby King. In the end, our forwards didn't make the metres that theirs did, and our bench had hardly any impact on the game. We struggled to get Blake Austin involved in the game thanks to the excellent defence of Theo Fages, while Jonny Lomax ended up winning the game for Saints in the second half. We go again though. We showed what we can do for large parts of that. That was a night to enjoy a wonderful atmosphere and appreciate a great team performance. I actually feel more confident in our chances this season after that loss than I did before!

It's always our year.

Daniel (@aloosewire)