SAINTS coach Paul Wellens accepts that he has made some mistakes during a challenging 2024 – but says both he and the team will improve off the lessons learned from a rocky season.
He was speaking after watching his side’s nerve-jangling and emotionally draining Golden Point play-off defeat at Warrington – and defeat that brought the curtain down on a disappointing season.
It had arguably been Saints' best performance since the Good Friday win over Wigan - but that did not make the result any more palatable.
Injuries have cast a huge shadow over the season – ravaging the backline, spine and the pack at various times – and sometimes overlapping.
But they do not present a complete alibi for the patchiness of the season, especially given the early cup exit at home to Warrington and the heavy defeat at Hull KR came when they still had a relatively healthy roster.
The bald harsh facts tell the story of a sixth-place finish – their lowest in Super League – and a record of just three wins from 12 league and cup games against their top five rivals.
However, there has been no doubt that attempts to make changes, and tactical tweaks to get the wheels back on have been hampered by both injuries and the poor form of some players.
And during that time Wellens has not gone short of advice, not all of it helpful – and when asked he says that contributes to part of his learning from the year.
He said: “My biggest learn is to block out the outside noise – it doesn't help - and there's plenty of it.
“And that's not me having to go ay anyone - people are entitled to their opinions and people care about the team and when the team doesn't win, they're disappointed and when the team wins they're happy.
“That's just the nature of the beast. But my biggest learn is stay on task, stay focused and stay identity driven.”
However, he puts his hand up to some of the things that went wrong this term.
“At times during the year because we were missing so many players I perhaps over-complicated things.
“I maybe tried too many things, different people in different positions, searching for answers because it comes from a place of care but I got a few things wrong whilst doing that.
“I've learned a lot of lessons from this year, which I feel I will and the team will improve off the back of.”
The silver lining from the dark injury cloud has been the opportunity to hand debuts to Harry Robertson, George Whitby, Noah Stephens and Jonny Vaughan – all players with potential and big futures.
They will now have a full pre-season to build on their promising starts in the senior squad.
Wellens added: “They've been great and I like the fact that a lot of them were in the stands tonight, watching them because they watch that and that's the level they have got to get to play in this team.
“And that might be a sobering thought, but that's the reality - you need to be able to compete like that in those games.
“So it's great for those young lads to witness it and what they need to do is have the mindset around preseason and now they can find those improvements because they're all brilliant lads who are willing to work very hard.”
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