ST HELENS will take on Hull FC this Friday night, live on Sky Sports as Paul Wellens spoke to the media today to preview the clash.
The Black and Whites were thrashed last week by Salford Red Devils, 60-14, but Wellens isn’t looking too much into that result.
“If you look at Hull’s squad and their coach Tony Smith as well as the calibre of players they’ve got the it will be a big challenge,” Wellens said.
“I won’t look too much into the result last weekend. You can get freak results like that in rugby league, they went to Headingley earlier in the year and won and that should give us the attitude to go after them.
“It’s been a really unpredictable Super League and it has thrown up what some people would class as surprise results.”
Wellens will be able to count on the return of Curtis Sironen following suspension with the Saints boss explaining why Alex Walmsley started on the bench in the loss to Leigh Leopards.
“Only Curtis Sironen is back and will return. Curtis has been fantastic for us since he’s been at the club. He is a fantastic player and improves us a team.
“There are a few bumps and bruises and niggles. Someone of James Roby’s age takes a few days longer to get over those but he has trained well and will play.
“Al’s training was disrupted, he had a bit of a infection that caused him to feel a little unwell and didn’t get the training exposure we would have wanted him to have.
“It was a late call whether he would play or not, I thought we would start Agnatius and so he could get his head around that during the week and Al would give us something off the bench
One man who will not play against Hull on Friday night will be Will Hopoate who has had his fair share of injuries since joining the Merseyside club back in 2022.
“It will probably frustrate our supporters that Will will be another week. He could play this weekend and feel confident to play but we have a medical team here.
“If it was a player that hadn’t been through Will’s recent injury history then we would have been more likely to take a chance with him.
“He has had a fair bit of training exposure but given his injury history it is important that he gets more training exposure into him. It is important we are patient.
“There is a lot of scar tissue around the injury that was causing him some discomfort and he had to have injections around that which he has taken well to. He is feeling more comfortable than he has done in a while.
