SAINTS coach Kristian Woolf has explained why prop Matty Lees was pulled out of the opening game of the Super League restart.

The current Super League Young Player of the Year complained of a sore throat on the eve of the game - something that would not be an issue in normal times.

But Saints took the cautious approach and left him out - drafting in Joe Batchelor to the bench and handing Kyle Amor more minutes as sub prop.

Woolf explained: "A week ago I was talking about being at full strength for the first time this year and within the space of a couple of days we had three blokes unavailable and then Matty Lees got a sore throat last night.

"Any other day of the week in normal times, Matty Lees is playing today but obviously these times are not normal and we have to be a bit more careful. That was the decision that was made.

"It was a little bit disruptive but every team is going to have something like that happen at some stage this year – it happened to us in the first game.

"Kyle Amor got a bit more time and I thought he did a really good job and Joe Batchelor got a spell in the middle after thinking he was 19th man today.

"He held his hands up well."