On the other point (not sure if it belongs here or on the other thread) I really don't like the playing for penalties that has increasingly crept into the game. I don't like it when Wigan do it and I certainly don't like it when it's done against us. I think it's fair to say that Walmsley is the worst in the league for trying to milk penalties. Even pundits like Carney and Pryce have made mention of it recently. However I think the Welsby incident is an altogether different beast. That's cynical taken to another level and I truly hope it's an aberration on Welsby's part and not something that's being coached

I have a lot of respect for how Walmsley has developed over the last 10 years or so but I worry that if he continues with his childish and churlish antics he legacy to non Saints fans will be of that of a whinging spoilt brat rather than an exceptional prop.

Over the year’s I’ve always had pride in our sport of the honesty of the players on how they approach and play the game but the increasing use of play acting in all it’s forms for me will seriously damage the sport unless the authorities look to stamp it out.

At some point and I think it won’t be too far away I genuinely think that there will be a clampdown on this type of behaviour. Personally if Walmsley or any player continuously tried to milk a penalty and whinge if they don’t get one If I was the referee I’d stop play and bring the player to me together with the captain and explain why I hadn’t given a penalty giving the defending team time to set up their defence. Do that a few times and I’m sure coaches would start insisting on just getting on with the game.

I’m a believer that the game is played in cycles. Recent history defence has been king for most teams. I think we are now starting to see more teams taking a risk partly as style of play but just as much that unless they do they won’t be able to unlock ever improving defences.

I’m using Walmsley as the example because as you say he is the obvious example who uses these tactics with monotonous regularity. I’d like to think that if a Wigan player used these tactics I’d be equally scathing and I’d use Marshall as our example of a player who literally expected a penalty every tackle albeit this thankfully now seems a tactic he uses less now than he did a year or two ago.

I'd broadly agree with that, and add that I think the refs in the NRL are a bit more up to speed with milking, and I hope SL refs start to behave in the same way, for the benefit of the game.

Saints fan here. I've been reading posts on here for some time and now felt compelled to register and join. I go by the username Reacher on Red Vee so those that know me (Rogues Gallery is one) know that I am reasonable and fair minded. There are also some decent posters on here- Nicky Kiss for example regularly gives Saints credit, in fact I think he is a closet Saints fan really

I understand that successful teams are there to be shot at and all other fans dislike them- Utd in the 90s and early 2000s being an example, (I am a Utd fan too) however some of the criticism that Saints are getting at the moment astounds me. This current team is outstanding and we have been for the past 3 years. Defensively it is the best team I've ever seen at Saints including the treble winning Daniel Anderson side of 2006.

What I can't get my head around is this notion that we are horrible to watch and poor in attack. Have you actually watched our games? We have posted big scores in the first 2 rounds played in poor conditions. Yes we played 12 men in both but look at the scores prior to the red cards, they were hardly game changers. We will also improve as the season continues.

Welsby and Dodd are two flair players that score tries from nothing, Dodd's kick and chase against Catalans and his brilliant step against Hull, Welsby with his brilliant kick through against Hull. We now attack both sides and in Percival have one of the best strike centres in the league. We are also missing Grace who gives us that X factor and can go the length of the field with a couple of steps.

I will agree that there were elements of last season that we were hard to watch, games won on brilliant defence and barge overs but you can see already this season a change of tactics with Welsby and Dodd having the confidence and freedom to do what they like. Lomax is also not confined to the left anymore and pops up all over the pitch.

I really can't understand the criticism we are receiving. I suppose we should be flattered really.

I think two games in when playing against teams with players sent off is hard to judge whether the style has really changed that much, but I do like the look of Dodds and he seems a much more heads-up style of player.

There is no denying that Saints are not the off the cuff 'entertainers' they once were. They have a very rigid structure and pressurise the opposition better than any other team with line speed and kick chase which often leads to mistakes and then Saints capitalise.

I'd be willing to bet that the amount of tries Saints get on the back of putting pressure on the opposition is far higher than any other team due to well organised and aggressive defence in the past two seasons.

Maybe it's because I'm a wigan fan - but I think the amount of claiming for a penalty by the Saints players is also far higher than any other team - but obviously have no metrics to back this up. I just think that along with the attention to detail that is put into all aspects of Saints play - and I think they are the best drilled team in the competition, this is also one area that gets alot of attention to detail in training too.

But thats treating Woolfs style as a coach as a static thing. As already has been said, over the last 12 months Saints fans have seen a marked change in their approach to the game. Its almost like Woolf had to spend the first year getting the defensive structures to his satisfaction, and has now remembered he needs to coach attack as well. When coupled with "the changing of the guard" in the spine, its lead to a very different style of play, and a much more enjoyable one to boot. The hyper defensive/ conservative "Woolfball" as it was called hasnt been mentioned since before the CC final.

I would also say GFs are not a good judge of how attacking or otherwise a team is, you defended like your lives depended on it that night, and your club were determined to send SOL out on a high. Ironcically, I have always said I dont think a Holbrook coached team would have won that game, theyd have become flustered and panicked - thus I think the more interesting game would have been if we hadnt have choked in the 2018 semi, and played in Wanes last game...

Grace, Hopoate, Amor and Bell all didnt play in the game vs Hull, so theres half of your 8 already Wingfield, Foster and Davies got a good amount of experience last year either through loan or DR, and Smith is currently on loan with Leigh with him not going to be getting game time ahead of Roby/ Lussick. Then throw in the next off the line (Sambou, Martyn, Bennison) and the other project we have (Norman) theyre a bit more wildcard but should be looking to step up in a game or two this year too.

Dan Norman too, though hes yet to break through into the first team at all I think (I think he was an unused sub in one game last year?) Itll be interesting if he gets renewed next year.

One thing we have been incredibly good at is retaining our young players. Welsby, Percival, Makinson, Dodd, Walmsley, Roby, Batchelor, Knowles all in the team with either long term contract, or been with us for a long time, depending on where they are in their career. Lees and Grace are out of contract this year, so will be interesting to see if theres a breaking point, or if this retention can continue.

I'd expect us to defend like our lives depend on it every week, but when we played a Holbrook side it didn't seem to matter. Take the points you made in the top paragraph though and as I said - all opinion and pretty much irrelevant.

Interesting. Had Holbrook not been fortunate in the draw and got Salford in a GF (a game which, by the way, was grinded out) we wouldn't be talking about "winning in style" we'd be taking about "failing every time it mattered".

Holbrook did a great job and we played some great stuff (notably with a box office player at FB in Barba). I do, however, think people have a tendency to conflate brutal defence with boring in attack - perhaps because games that aren't close are less interesting for the neutral. I don't think post-Fages Saints are at all boring to watch but I accept that neutrals don't want to watch one sided games, of which we've had a fair few.

We don't have Ben Barba - nobody has a player like that, although French and Field have shown glimpses - but I think Welsby, Dodd, Grace and even Walmsley/Paasi up front absolutely are exciting players in the way they approach the game.

We've scored 60+ points in our two games against tough sides (Catalans at home and Hull away) in bad conditions - some brilliant tries in there. I sense that latterly people are bored with a bit of dominance rather than the rugby we play ball in hand.

I also think that, whilst this is not the forum for it to be accepted, there is also a big difference in culture/approach between the Saints and Wigan teams that are being compared here. People talk about Walmsley trying to win penalties as if he invented it, but much of the criticism towards Wigan was about how they went about the game and whether it crossed the line at times. Everyone will have an opinion on that but I don't think we'll see Woolf instructing his players to recklessly endanger opponents or players being so revved up they punch unconscious players on the ground or behave in the sort of deranged manner we saw with Isa last year. I genuinely believe there are differnt cultures in place at both clubs in that regard in recent years (an exception being 2021 Bentley who at that time was getting hammer from Saints fans for his approach and ill-discipline) but, again, I acknowledge and accept that will come across as rose tinted Saints bias.

I'd word it slightly differently. People conflate brutal defence with dull or boring attack when it isn't their team doing it. As you and others did when it was Wigan and as some here and others are doing now regarding Saints. That's exactly the point. We defended it using exactly the same reasoning you and Stu are doing here.

I'd like to take issue with your Barba statement though. I think French in particular has already shown he has everything Barba had and more and Field, in admittedly a small game sample, has strongly suggested he will follow suit. I say "and more" because, unlike Barba, they can both defend!

That said, this is another example of what I'm saying above really. As a Saint fan Barba was better. As a Wigan fan I'd have French (and probably Field in time) over Barba any day.

Barba's defence was terrible but we are talking about entertainment and Barba on his day was ridiculous. Field is lighning quick but he'll have a long way to go to match peak Barba - I hope for the sake of the league he does. I'm going to try not to scoff at the Field comparison just yet and I'll certainly reserve judgement on whether he can defend

On the French comparison - he was great in 2020 and scored 17 tries. In his MoS season Barba scored 31 and probably another 25/30 assists - he was unplayable. Unless you wanted to run at him.