Not being funny but why would you chose his 3rd game in a week, and after playing decent minutes in his second in 3 days on Monday, to question his fitness? Ellis did go well but he's just returned from a 6 week rest!

Agreed. And again we brought Mago on around 32mins when we dropped our intensity (Smith try aside), giving him only a few minutes before the Salford pack could regain some energy at halftime.

Ellis - 17 carries, 115m, 23 tk
Smithies - 15 carries, 93m, 27 tk
Havard - 15 carries, 97m, 30 tk
Mago - 4 carries, 36m, 13 tk
Byrne - 7 carries, 28m, 26 tk

Interesting that the 2 'ever presents' in Mago and Byrne returned the lowest figures. Coincidence? I think not.

They play 80 mins of rugby a week. This includes Easter as they are props.

The rest of the week they train and recover. I'd be very surprised if the conditioning guys don't have access to a multitude of data on each of the players. If they are knackered, then reduce their training, or give them more rest within the week. Madness however not to play them.

Smithies is really impressing me this season. He’s quietly going about his business but his output in terms of the ground he’s making is getting better, his discipline has been much improved and he’s rock solid defensively and does all the dirty work really well. I saw him described as a Poundland Morgan Knowles on the Saints forum and they should know more than anyone that players like those two can’t be judged on stats alone. He’s not at Knowles current level but he’s improving and is better than Knowles was at 21. He just needs to keep progressing as Knowles did.

Agree completely. Compared to the player he has turned out to be, Morgan Knowles was once a poundshop Morgan Knowles!

Saints are reaping the rewards of a lot of good players coming into their prime at around the same time. The lure of Australia and various other circumstances has stopped us from doing the quite same thing over the last 6 or 7 years, but there are really promising signs this year that our current crop of young forwards are slowly moving from away from just having potential and towards being players who can genuinely hold their own against good teams with more experienced packs.

Smithies still has some way to go to get near Knowles' level, but he'll be one of the best in the league in his style in a few years if he carries on this progression. Partington is the only one I'm still a bit concerned about seeing as he turns 24 this year.

He's way better than Knowles was at 21 who was little more than a bit part player at that age. That's why comparisons between Knowles and O'Loughlin are laughable. Compare their relative careers at similar ages. Knowles isn't even an established international yet. Whether Smithies gets to the Knowles at 25 is the interesting question but he's showing all the necessary year on year improvements to suggest he may. This year has been a quantum leap for him in terms of consistency and attitude. The biggest factor is he's now concentrating on his rugby rather than the niggle and he's twice the player for it.

Smithies, Byrne and Havard are all showing the signs this year of what they are capable of. It's early days for all of them but each has the attributes to get there if they apply themselves.

I am not going to get in to whether Smithies is better than Knowles was at 21 but I have to pick you up on the opening sentence mate. At just 20 (2017) Knowles was a 30 game a season player for us, starting 17 of those 30. He's been well-established from a very young age to be fair.

Yeah, I agree it wasn't the best way of putting it. It wasn't meant to disparage him in any way. I just meant no one was speaking about him as being anything special up until the last couple of years and he was more a solid club man. Even now he's only played 1 international for England in what wasn't much more than a friendly fixture. At 25 that doesn't smack of a 'superstar in the making' if you get my drift.

Nothing against Knowles meant by the comment though as he's s fine player.

Yeah I think he did go under the radar for a while in terms of not getting much recognition outside of Saints fans. I don't think he will ever be seen as a "superstar" because that's not his style really. He does all the stuff that coaches and teammates love and he's one of those players whose brilliance is almost more evident when he's not there than when he is, if that makes sense.

He's an extremely consistent, hardworking player though and I wouldn't swap him for another 13 in the league, without a shadow of a doubt. In a similar sense you guys probably wouldn't swap Liam Farrell for anyone. Now for me Farrell is an outstanding player but there are many people outside of Wigan fans who just don't/can't see it. Sometimes certain players don't get hyped enough and I think those two are evidence of that.

The international thing with Knowles is probably down to the fact he played for Wales at first and then Shaun Wane got him to change allegiance to England as soon as took the job.

Back to Smithies, he has similar work rate and aggression that we've seen for years with Knowles, I just think he needs to improve with ball in hand if he is going to stay at 13. I've not personally seem him doing anything really impressive in an attacking sense yet, but at 21 he has bags of time and potential.

Agree with all of that mate. Maybe have a slightly different view internationally though as playing for Wales, Ireland etc tends to be because you can't make the England side and Wane getting him to change allegiance is because he's now arguably the best 13 in the comp. I think if it was anything other than that he wouldn't have changed allegiance. Had he been anything special earlier on in his career he'd have been selected then as many outstanding young players are. KPP and Dodd being recent examples.

Not sure on that but no way of "proving" it as such. Wayne Bennett, when it came to England/GB was lazy and ignorant. There were numerous examples of him picking players on reputation, I am absolutely convinced he didn't watch Super League games. I'd be surprised if he had heard of Morgan Knowles.

True, it's all hypothesis. However he didn't stand out during those years in Superleague either and in no way would he have got a place over the other back row options we had at that time. He would have had to displace the likes of O'Loughlin, Sam Burgess, Elliott Whitehead etc and he simply wasn't at that level. I think suggesting otherwise would be revisionist at best. Happy to agree to disagree though if you think otherwise.

No you're right he wasn't. But I think had Wane been in position say 2 years earlier then the conversation re. Knowles switching from Wales would have happened sooner than it did.

Apologies for turning this in to another Wigan/Saints debate people.

I just see a lot of similarities with Smithies and Knowles and what they do or do not bring to a team. A comment about Smithies being a Poundland Knowles is exactly the sort of clueless comment Knowles himself would’ve faced until he started to get good press, so Saints fans are actually the last people you think you’d get it from (well maybe not).

I do think Smithies is more advanced at 21 than Knowles was but he did start in our first team a couple of years before Knowles did in theirs IIRC, so that isn’t like for like. What he needs to do now is to make sure he progresses like Knowles has. He’s on his way and I think longer term he’ll end up as captain of this club and he’ll play internationally ‘if’ he continues on the path he’s on now.