SAINTS coach Kristian Woolf explained Jack Welsby’s absence from today’s big win at Hull FC – and also outlined why Sione Mata’utia was withdrawn in the second half.

The versatile Welsby sat out the 60-6 win that sees Saints go six points clear at the Super League summit.

But that was mitigated by the return of Will Hopoate at full back, leaving Mata’utia to slot in at centre and Ben Davies at six.

Woolf said: “There was a little bit of everything with Jack after last week’s game – he took a head knock, had a bit of a tight hamstring and took a bump around his neck late in the game.

“He is just carrying a few things that we knew that if we rolled him out there this week and kept asking him to play every week then at some stage we were going to put him at real risk.

“He is obviously a key players for us – and one we want fresh and firing for the big games, so it was important we made a little sacrifice there.

“The other three guys coming back in meant we knew we had a good enough team to go out there and win a game.”

He said that Welsby will be “100 per cent” back in the fold for Friday’s home game against Hull KR.

When asked about Mata’utia’s injury, Woolf said: “The fact that he’s limping like he was says there’s something there.

“He thinks he’s just been stood on – but it didn’t seem to be improving in a hurry.

“We have had awful luck with our outside backs. Sione is a back rower but he can do a job out there as we saw today.

“Once he started limping we needed to make sure we took him off as a precaution.”