An assessment of Kristian Woolf's three years at St Helens

Any assessment of the 47-year-old Queenslander’s three-year tenure must take account of the players he has helped nurture and push through to become fully fledged first teamers since 2020, the way he has evolved the champion team he inherited into one with a harder edge the diligent way he has laid the groundwork for his successor.

A steely defence has been key – the figures show that if you take out this year's odd blip at Salford and the defeats suffered by the two youthful teams.

And then there are the values that have been inculcated into the set up; the collective “all for one and one for all” togetherness, the fighting spirit that has come to the fore this term given the adversity they have faced with injury.

His decision to return to Australia at the end of this season has been greeted with much disappointment from the Saints support base that has slowly but surely warmed to him after initially reserving judgement in the opening weeks of 2020.

For the past two- and a-bit years there has been significant mutual affection between coach, players, fans and the town that the Woolf family have made home.

Looking back, it was something of a master stroke by the Saints board to sign up Woolf when they did.

In the autumn of 2019, Just weeks after agreeing to take the Saints head coach’s job vacated by Justin Holbrook’s return to the NRL, Woolf’s coaching stock rocketed sky-high.

But instead of soaking up the warm afterglow of his Tongan side’s success over Great Britain and Australia Woolf was flying to this chillier and damper side of the rugby league world to take on a different challenge.

He walked into a club and town that was also feeling good about itself after lifting their first major trophy in five years with the Grand Final win over Salford at Old Trafford.

Inheriting a winning team can often be a poisoned chalice for a coach – after all there’s only one direction a champion team can go and with that tag you have all-comers wanting to take a pot-shot at the top dogs on a weekly basis.

It was not just that. Holbrook’s popularity in his two-and-a-bit years at the helm also made him a tough act to follow, after delivering Saints from eight or nine uninspiring years – punctuated by the occasional highlight – with the last couple leading to what prop Alex Walmsley described as creating a “hostile environment”.

So, Woolf was not simply replacing a winner, but also someone seen as a saviour.

What is more, Holbrook’s seemingly permanent smile had been transferred into the brand of rugby Saints played and, just like now, there was genuine disappointment when he departed for the Gold Coast Titans.

On arrival at the club in November 2019, Woolf did not make any grand statements, only to say that the players would be allowed “free rein to attack and use their skill level” citing the way his Tonga side had played with him at the helm.

Although he took over the same squad that finished top of the pile for the second year running, with no new additions, Woolf declared: “We need to find ways to be better.”

Those ways, both with the ball and without it were kept in house…and if truth be told initially it was hard to judge.

There were a couple of things at play here that contributed to a patchy start to 2020 – key men like Tommy Makinson, James Roby and Morgan Knowles were missing from the outset after undergoing off season surgery and by week two they were joined by Lachlan Coote and briefly Alex Walmsley.

And Saints’ GB Lions contingent returned with no little physical and mental fatigue from a tour that had seen them whitewashed by New Zealand, Tonga and Papua New Guinea. Of those the previous year’s Harry Sunderland winner Luke Thompson – a player so key to Saints’ go-forward in 2019 – had popped a rib cartilage on tour.

But Saints had an early focus to lift for – the World Club Challenge game against Sydney Roosters.

And lift they did – despite the absence of key outside backs Coote, Regan Grace and Mark Percival they pushed the Aussie champions all the way in a 20-12 defeat.

That in itself was a refreshing change following the World Series shellackings they had endured in 2015 and 16.

But we would soon see it came at a cost with a series of flat performances and back-to-back losses to Huddersfield and an utterly listless performance on a strange day at Castleford. Grumbles were a plenty as was the ‘Back to Cunningham’ line.

Suddenly, two defeats in a row were about to become the least of our worries.

Covid, which had been spreading through the world all the way through the early part of 2020, suddenly put sport and everyday work and life on hold.

Although the impact on lives and livelihoods was dreadful, the halting of the national sports programme – including Super League – had a positive impact on jaded Saints and skipper James Roby credited it with contributing to his longevity.

With play halted for 14 or so weeks, the team could re-charge and when they pressed the re-set button they were a different side.

There had been one personnel change – veteran former skipper James Graham returned for a swansong to replace Thompson, who had joined the Canterbury Bulldogs.

Woolf had re-drawn the plans. They bounced through those early behind-closed doors games at Headingley – walloping Catalans and Leeds with three try Regan Grace racing in for some spectacular scores as Saints exploited the no scrums, six again restart faster game.

The opposition soon adapted to try and negate the advantages of those rules, but Saints had a bounce even if the season often seemed surreal.

It was not simply the absence of fans on echoey terraces, but the players and staff were having to make a number of sacrifices and daily rituals to keep Covid at bay.

What may often be forgotten, but lockdown and isolation was tough as we all did the right thing (well, most of us) to combat the spread of Covid.

But it must have been doubly difficult for a flukey try – off the head of Warrington’s Anthony Gelling – compounded by the injury loss of Jack Welsby and Mark Percival saw Saints exit the Challenge Cup.

Eyes were now totally on the big one. Although a home defeat by Wigan handed the Warriors the League Leaders Shield, Woolf’s Saints learned from that.

And what followed in the BCD Grand Final at Hull is now the stuff of legend, with Welsby’s after the bell winner against Wigan now indelibly marked into St Helens and rugby league folklore.

Welsby had been a player nurtured and pushed into the first team by Woolf, eventually settling into the centre role vacated by the injured Percival.

But that victory had been all about the doggedness that Woolf had instilled into the team.

There had been times in previous years when Saints had failed their test of mettle in the really big games. A string of semi-final defeats from 2015, plus the Wembley loss in 2019, had maybe harshly earned the team a reputation as chokers. It was important to build on the 2019 Grand Final win over Salford and create a pattern of winning the big games that count.

There was a collective buy-in for that.

Of course you need leaders for that – Alex Walmsley led from the front and the brains trust of Jonny Lomax, Lachlan Coote and James Roby were the architects with the ball.

But there was something else – a doggedness epitomised by the approach of James Bentley, who had played centre and nine before settling into his customary second row.

Bentley’s progress under Woolf, and Joe Batchelor’s in year two were two small examples of players growing from the fringes to fully-fledged Super League starters.

Woolf’s second year saw new recruits as his team evolved with arrival of Agnatius Paasi, Sione Mata’utia and Joel Thompson to replace Zeb Taia and Dom Peyroux.

The dipping in and out of teenager Lewis Dodd would eventually prepare Saints for a new half back combination.

The silver linings of Theo Fages’ broken shoulder at Wembley was the way Jack Welsby again changed the game off the bench to deliver the first Challenge Cup since 2008 with a triumph over Castleford.

The second was the way Dodd seamlessly slotted in in subsequent weeks. His skillset – kicking and running game - had already been identified.

There had been a clamour to “get Dodd in” but even the player himself would later admit that getting drip fed 10 minutes off the bench at nine to allow him to come to terms with Super League’s physicality had been beneficial.

Back-to-back titles for Woolf and an unprecedented Saints three-peat followed with Saints holding their nerve against the ferocity and guile of the Catalans Dragons.

Saints trailed that game until late on, but there was never a panic or a deviation from the plan. The game was always in hand, and when the opportunity came Kevin Naiqama executed and the nerveless Coote nailed the winning goal.

Woolf’s final year was always going to have a different challenge with a changing of the guard - new recruits in Konrad Hurrell, Will Hopoate, James Bell, Curtis Sironen and Joey Lussick replaced old favourites Coote, Fages, Naiqama and Bentley.

But knitting those together has been the least of the coach’s concerns with injury decimating the backline in particular.

That Saints have finished top of the table, despite losing linchpin Lewis Dodd at Easter, seeing half back partner Jonny Lomax rupture a bicep, Regan Grace out for the season and Mark Percival and Will Hopoate miss significant chunks.

Throw in the fact that Sironen and Mata’utia have taken it in turns getting banned and then you can see why it has been difficult to get consistency on the Saints edges.

There was a Plan B for losing one or two key men, but Woolf has had to adjust weekly to plans D, E and F.

And yet that belief in the squad, particularly young lads like Jon Bennison, Ben Davies and Jake Wingfield, and that sense of togetherness and that not knowing when they are beaten has ensured so far that this depleted squad has not fallen back on that as an excuse.

That they are still up there despite that ludicrous casualty list is a real testament to the ethic instilled into this breed of Saints.

And if Woolf were to sign off with another Grand Final success that - given the adversity – would trump all others.

That will be the only focus Woolf will have at the forefront of his mind for his final four weeks at the Saints helm.