What are your expectations for 2016??? : Tue Jan 19, 2016 11:17 am  

My first choice side when everyone is fit and healthy would be

Lomax
Makinson
Percival
Turner
Swift
Burns
Walsh
Walmsley
Roby
Amor
Greenwood
McCarthy-Scarsbrook
Wilkin

Bench

Fages
Vea
Tasi
Thompson

I know some of you will have your own prefences when it comes to team selection and that's normal. I do generally believe Cunningham has strengthened the squad well. The signing in particular of Theo Fages has impressed me and like KC says slashing Roby's minutes on the field is vital so we don't break the player and Fages can learn from Walsh for at least 12 months before he decides to go back to Australia. I don't know much about Peryoux so I really cant pass comment on him until I have seen him in the opening rounds of the season. Jack Owens will prove to be a great signing in my opinion, that lad has some serious potential and at a club like St Helens he can only improve and in time will become one of the best Full Backs in the league, I am genuinely confident of that.

My expectations are that we should be fighting on all fronts for the trophies on offer this year. We were desperately close to getting to two major finals last year. The Cup Semi-Final was of our own doing. We couldn't handle Leeds in the first 50 or so minutes and when we did start to play it was too late. The Semi-Final in the Super League we were truly outstanding from 1st minute to the 80th and one moment of complete brilliance from Kevin Sinfield took the game away from us and we all know what happened next. KC will be a better coach this year for last years experience, he will be more determined than ever to see us succeed this year and I believe with abit of luck, stay away from any serious injuries we could well do something special this year. We have a settled squad of players that will only improve, the vast majority of this squad has won a major trophy and knows how to win big games, In Cunningham and Longy we have two coaches that know how to win big trophies on the playing side and like I said before they will be better coaches from last years experience.

Lets hope for a great 2016

Foz

Re: What are your expectations for 2016??? : Tue Jan 19, 2016 9:46 pm  

I think top 4 would be a good finish. Maybe decent cup run. I don't think we will win anything

Re: What are your expectations for 2016??? : Wed Jan 20, 2016 11:44 am  

What happened to Travis Burns? http://superleague.co.uk/matchday/player/2575

What happened to Travis Burns? http://superleague.co.uk/matchday/player/2575

Re: What are your expectations for 2016??? : Wed Jan 20, 2016 12:28 pm  

Looks like he has joined Sheffield. I like his new haircut. Knocks years off him.

Re: What are your expectations for 2016??? : Wed Jan 20, 2016 1:09 pm  

My expectations are a top 6 finish and a season of frustration. The signings we've made are very poor. Only Fages has the potential to improve us and I fear that the intended use of him this season will ruin any chance he has of making it at Saints. Instead of using him as a utility player and chopping between 7 and 9 all the time, we should be identifying his intended position and putting him there now full time. Tasi is a poor signing, a very average player at Salford and he'll contribute little this season. Peyroux is an absolute joke signing, a player who was a fringe professional in the NRL and definitely not getting another professional contract. Owens is a mid-table SL player, no more.

Fullback will be an issue for us this season, Lomax looks to still be having issues (What is the truth on him?). Centres are fine, Percival will hopefully grow into one of the league's best centres this year, Turner will hopefully be 'okay'. Both wingers are fine, but not dangerous individually. The halves are a real concern for me, Burns hasn't hit the heights people thought he would and Walsh, for all his quality just hasn't shown up for Saints. I'd have cut both from the squad this year.

In short, solid but not capable of winning a trophy. Add a quality prop and a big backrower and we'd compete.

Top 4 has got to be the aim, but I'm not sure how realistic that is. Leeds, Wigan, Warrington and Huddersfield would all feel confident about being a better side than us and Cas, Catalans and potentially even Hull could be in and around us. It's not going to be easy to get top 4 this season. For all we mock Warrington, they've again reshaped their squad and could be much stronger this season. Wigan don't seem to have improved much but they're so well drilled they would be top 4 with any squad of players. Leeds are potentially due a slip in standards, but their recruitment is far better than our's and they have some outstanding players so hard to see them dropping too much. We need to start the season strongly and get ahead of Warrington and Leeds in particular as they integrate their new players.

Re: What are your expectations for 2016??? : Wed Jan 20, 2016 2:37 pm  

Saddened! wrote:

My expectations are a top 6 finish and a season of frustration. The signings we've made are very poor. Only Fages has the potential to improve us and I fear that the intended use of him this season will ruin any chance he has of making it at Saints. Instead of using him as a utility player and chopping between 7 and 9 all the time, we should be identifying his intended position and putting him there now full time. Tasi is a poor signing, a very average player at Salford and he'll contribute little this season. Peyroux is an absolute joke signing, a player who was a fringe professional in the NRL and definitely not getting another professional contract. Owens is a mid-table SL player, no more.

Fullback will be an issue for us this season, Lomax looks to still be having issues (What is the truth on him?). Centres are fine, Percival will hopefully grow into one of the league's best centres this year, Turner will hopefully be 'okay'. Both wingers are fine, but not dangerous individually. The halves are a real concern for me, Burns hasn't hit the heights people thought he would and Walsh, for all his quality just hasn't shown up for Saints. I'd have cut both from the squad this year.

In short, solid but not capable of winning a trophy. Add a quality prop and a big backrower and we'd compete.

Top 4 has got to be the aim, but I'm not sure how realistic that is. Leeds, Wigan, Warrington and Huddersfield would all feel confident about being a better side than us and Cas, Catalans and potentially even Hull could be in and around us. It's not going to be easy to get top 4 this season. For all we mock Warrington, they've again reshaped their squad and could be much stronger this season. Wigan don't seem to have improved much but they're so well drilled they would be top 4 with any squad of players. Leeds are potentially due a slip in standards, but their recruitment is far better than our's and they have some outstanding players so hard to see them dropping too much. We need to start the season strongly and get ahead of Warrington and Leeds in particular as they integrate their new players.

I think Tasi can be a decent signing and if his attitude is right he will be a definite upgrade on mose. He will give us meters, aggression and play longer mins than mose so imo it's a upgrade.

Theo has potential and impressed last season when Salford had no halves so I think he improves the squad.

Peyroux has been awful every time I've seen him play. He's big and soft. His defence is on par with Turner and his attack consists of a silly skip and jump before he hits the line so Based on this he will be a hit with saints fans as he smiles and Samoan.

Jack Owens is a funny one. Certainly has potential and looks decent but we have Lomax, SMD, Bailey in our first team squad and the likes of swifty, Tommy and theo who cover fullback spot. If he's on rubbish wage then I'm happy but I know his salary at widnes and I'm sure he's not took less money.

We need lomax back to his best and need to keep Walsh(if he's got bottle back), Walmsley, Vea and Roby fit most of the year or we will be toothless in attack again.

I'd go

Lomax
Tommy
Turner
Percy
Swift
Burns
Walsh
Walmsley
Roby
Amor
Vea
LMS
Wilkin

Fages
Tasi
Greenwood
Sav

Re: What are your expectations for 2016??? : Wed Jan 20, 2016 4:46 pm  

I've said for years that Saints won't move forward as a club until they cut their losses and release Jonny Lomax.

Re: What are your expectations for 2016??? : Wed Jan 20, 2016 4:55 pm  

Pacific wrote:

I've said for years that Saints won't move forward as a club until they cut their losses and release Jonny Lomax.

Seeing as it was only little over 18 months ago that he got a season ending injury away at Catalans, exactly how many "years" ago did you start thinking we should cut our losses?

Re: What are your expectations for 2016??? : Wed Jan 20, 2016 5:09 pm  

Pacific wrote:

I've said for years that Saints won't move forward as a club until they cut their losses and release Jonny Lomax.

Seriously? Even before he got injured and was at times a one man attack for us. He was our go to man with ball. Safe as houses under the kick and very rare missed a tackle.

Re: What are your expectations for 2016??? : Wed Jan 20, 2016 5:57 pm  

A top 4 finish is a good finish and I am confident we can achieve that. I suspect the position you finish in the top 4 is less important than how you get there.

The problem for us in 2015 was the Leeds Rhinos and given that they will not be the same team in 2016 immediately improves our chances regardless of how we perform.

I would personally like to get to the cup final. That has been what I have wanted at the start of every season for the last few years.

Looking at our signing Fages is a massive boost, he will either keep Walsh honest or replace him completely. The only small problem with that is Fages is not the best kicker. Tasi for Mose is a loss as a lot of our tries came off Mose runs in 2015 and Tasi looks more of a worker. Jones for Peyroux is also a down grade but I suspect that Ashworth will be Jones true replacement and could easily turn into a better player in the long run. Owens looks a good player and will provide us with cover at our trouble position of Fullback as well as better cover than Dawson on the wing.

Looking at the rest of the competition there is no reason why this can't be our season.