Josh Hodgson
Stevo
Ryan Sutton (so far)
Bateman has gone back
Elliot Whitehead
Dom Young
etc...

Don’t feed the troll…

As a saints fan..it stings! Ignore redvee and the “I’m not bothered” brigade. Of course they are. According to his dad saints were his first choice but weren’t prepared to pay what wigan were offering which was close to his nrl Salary at the bulldogs.

Great signing for Wigan.easily the best pack in SL next season

That’s nice

I would agree with that Stu. If I was a Saints fan(obviously I am not otherwise I would have one eye, three ears and two noses - only joking), I would have concerns about your front row. Many Saints fans are commenting that the club is well stacked in that department with Knowles, Matautia and a bunch of young lads being capable of filling the void. That’s where we were for most of the last decade and, although we had some decent backs they got no room to operate in as our forwards were more than often second best. Relying on the two previously mentioned players plus kids is a recipe for disaster. The problem is that there are few federation trained props around who possess the necessary quality (Wigan has been busy snapping them up) and therefore replacing the likes of Walmsley is going to be very difficult. Losing Welsby would put you on the same trajectory that we experienced when Tomkins left and it will become a mighty struggle to climb the hill.

Added to that, Junior has signed a new contract. Dream on I say.

Stu, I figured you were better than that - posting on Redvee! Seriously, there are some good posters on there but they are seriously outnumbered by dicks.

To be fair. There are no concerns from me about Saints pack for next season. They will still be in the top 2 packs along with Wigan. The concern is the lack of pace in the three quarters and the impotent scrum half which will be their undoing.

I cant see past a wigan grand final this season. They have hit form at just the right time. Given the signings they have made for next season and beyond, plus how utterly weak every other SL team is bar St Helens, its not beyond the realms of possibility that they emulate Saints 4 peat.

Please, just do me a favour. Go and beat those cocky idiots from Penrith next february.

Penrith won’t make that mistake again. They will take next year seriously.

Comments like this really wind me up and are just a way of dismissing our achievement. They were practically at full strength and you only have to see the footage of their players at the end to realise how seriously they took it.

I suggest you read Ivan Cleary's comments here.
“We were pretty bummed about that one.

“We absolutely gave it our best, it was the first game of the year and St Helens were too good for us that night.

“It would be nice to get another shot at it.”

I think you are overstating issues in the Saints pack.

Walmsley
Clark
Lees
Sironen
Batchelor
Bell

Knowles
Sione
Delaney
Mbye

We then have Wingfield, Eseh (apparently), Paasi to come back in mid-season hopefully before moving on to younger prospects. We also have back row options (including Whitley) which means Sironen could play prop if needed which he is more than capable of doing.

I know people keep saying Knowles and Sione aren't props, but that doesn't change the fact that they are actually excellent props!

We probably need one more prop but I'm not concerned to be honest, I'm more concerned about us signing a strike outside back.

It's silly to try and decry the Saints win last year. They beat the Aussies on their own soil which is a great achievement.

Just on the Cleary quote though: it's entirely possible to give it your best but be under prepared. Just ask the US Ryder cup team

It's certainly true that they could up there game this time around simply by preparing better or having more warm up games. Whether they will or not remains to be seen. The Aussies still have the attitude that they "only need to turn up" despite history telling a different story.

Quotes after a game are meaningless. He's hardly going to say "yeah, we didn't really train for it", or "to be honest it was a warm-up game and there are bigger prizes later on in the year".

It's pretty obvious they didn't take it as serious as they should and the Saints fans jumping on a quote or two, speaks louder about what they really think than any indignation coming out of their mouths.

That being said, I'm happy they won. But just like the academy GF, I'm not buying into the Saints PR about how it was the test it should have been.