SAINTS boss Justin Holbrook says he has thought deeply in the off-season about the way the club fell short in the big games last term.

But he will not be changing anything too drastic, given the way the team performed on the whole.

Holbrook said: “I have gone through a lot and done a lot of deep thinking.

“I had a few days in the Lake District – I was meant to be relaxing a bit, but all I kept thinking about was next year and how to change things.

“And you initially want to tip everything out and throw it away, but then when you calm down you realise we won 26 out of 30 but lost the two big ones.

“It is hard because we lost them in different fashion. In the Challenge Cup we got ambushed and blown off the park, but the other was a tough game we led until the last five-and-half minutes.

“We can’t fix that now, we have to build the season.

“For us it is about working a bit harder than last year and the new players will help too, the younger guys will have more experience so the squad will be in better shape for the bigger games next year.

“The play-offs are much fairer now, but we have no excuses last year because we knew the format.”