Who'd have thought 3 months ago that we'd be on here, clamouring for a club legend to be dropped for Kyle Eastmond?

What a fickle mistress sport is.

Or maybe we are just very practical in St Helens and used to reforming characters.

Paul Wellens is still a good club player, and has been a fantastic full back, I dont get all this "he's crap" "drop him" that I read on here sometimes, he's still always in the right place, pops up with tries and puts his body on the line. Okay he may have lost his pace but he's clever enough to make up for that.

I don't think any sensible Saints fan thinks he is crap. Far from it. What we have seen however, is the likes of Tomkins and Hodgson returning the ball at pace and creating a better attacking platform for the forwards to be on. Tomkins is probably making an average of 10 metres more than Wello on a kick return and is leaving Wigan on the front foot when beginning their attacks. Eastmond is capable of this and possibly more due to him being so elusive.

Eastmond doesn't have 1% of Tomkins' bravery though, and bravery is absolutely massive for a full back.

I have visions of Eastmond bottling falling on a loose ball in a big game and costing us.

I echo these sentiments, but am willing to put faith in Kyle in the hopes that he wants to go out from Saints with a bang, rather than the whimper that was prevailing earlier in the season.

Lomax has the bavery you crave, which adds to the case for him being our future #1.

Wello won't play this Sunday.

You might be. I'm not. I think we will be defensively very vulnerable on our line on Sunday.

We have been all season even with Wello perhaps because we've not been able to get up the field as well as we used to. Having pace at the back should help us to negate Rovers' usually excellent kicking game.

Having eastmond at fullback means we will almost certain start our set at least 20 meters higher up the field then having wello there. That IMO has been a area we started to struggle on as we rely on our forwards to do the hard yards to clear our line then expect a wonder kick by Gaskell to get us in their half.

Having eastmond at fullback also means we maybe a target for high balls and also suspect on his defence. I don't think eastmond or any other fullback in tue world would have stopped vaccuri (sp) against Catalan at the weekend.

I think we with kyles recent good run of form that he should stay at fullback and wello will have to fight for his spot back.

Todays reporter states that Wellens is fit for the challenge cup game. Looks like he will possibly be playing.

Well that's in contrast to what I've been told. Interesting.

It's simple for me the best should play.

So if Wellens form picks up then sure he should get the position back. I'm more practical that dogmatic. The issue was until Eastmond played FB, I had not seen anyone who was either up to Wellens standard or who offered something different.

Wellens
Makinson
Shenton
Meli
Foster
Hohaia
Lomax
Perry
Roby
Puletua
Soliola
Laffranchi
Wilkin

Clough
LMS
Moore/Flanagan/flannery
Gaskell/wheeler

This still looks a very good team for next year.

Although

Hohaia
Makinson
Shenton
Meli
Foster
Pryce
Lomax

For the backs would be even better!