In a game full of intensity and excellent defensive displays, the visitors Warrington defeated St Helens at the Totally Wicked Stadium.
Two teams who took part in the Challenge Cup semi-final double-header just two weeks ago at the Leigh Sports Village, came head to head on Thursday night at the Totally Wicked Stadium. Saints came out of the Cup Semi-finals with a win, booking their place at Wembley, however, that wasn’t the case for Wire.
After some soul searching in the week after the loss to Castleford Tigers, it was back to winning ways for the Wolves last week at home against Wakefield Trinity. After losing in the South of France, St Helens got back to winning ways, but some supporters haven’t been too happy with the side’s performances of late, especially in attack and that continued last night.
The opening exchanges were frantic, but it was the Wolves who started the better of the two sides. Saints couldn’t break through the Warrington line until the 14th minute when the home side were awarded a penalty by the referee, Chris Kendall. A penalty which Lachlan Coote kicked and gave the red vee a 2-0 lead.
Still, Warrington kept up the pressure and matched Saints in every department. As below par as St Helens were with the ball in hand in the first half, they are back to back champions so the away team had to be sharp in defence.
Wolves head coach, Steve Price prides himself on how resilient his side are and they played on that in the game because Warrington were terrific in defence.
However the game became end to end and it took until the twenty-second minute for the first and only try, Ben Currie broke the deadlock and scored a brilliant try. The ball went through hands to Gareth Widdop out the back to the eventual man of the match, Stefan Ratchford who then set Tom Lineham free, he found Currie on the inside to go over next to the posts.
After that, minutes passed in the game and it was purely a battle of the defences with neither side able to find a way over the line. Which meant Warrington left the Totally Wicked Stadium with the two points. A big win for Steve Price’s side.
Wire now with back to back wins, completely putting the Challenge Cup exit out of their system and strengthening their place in the top four. For Kristian Wolf and St Helens, they slip to third in the league, they will need to get back to winning ways as soon as possible with the loss in France clearly still denting their league form.