Brown promises changes for Saints

St Helens coach Nathan Brown has confirmed that his team will show a number of changes when they face Wakefield at Langtree Park on Friday evening.

Injuries to key men have dogged Saints this season, and their last outing ended in defeat at Hull FC.

Brown has dicussed tactical changes with his playing group, though, and is expecting better things, after some positive work in training this week.

“There’ll be some minor adjustments, we’ve had a look at a number of things,” he said.

“It didn’t happen overnight, there was a lot of thought. Being out of the Cup and having a week off gave us time to think about numbers of things.

“On the back of that, we got to sit down with certain players and come up with what we thought was best and put it to the playing group.

“The players in these key positions and the senior players thought it would be good to have a shot at it.

“We’ve had four or five good training days, and each day we’d like to think we’ve progressed. But training’s one thing and playing is obviously another.”

Wakefield have shown remarkable improvement in recent weeks, and now could be outside contenders for a top-eight place.

Brown knows that they have threats all over the park, and his men will need to be on guard.

“Any time a side goes through a five-week period where they knock over Warrington, Leeds and Wigan, well, the top sides would take that, it shows great resolve,” he said.

“I don’t think it’s any coincidence that Tim Smith‘s gone back to Wakefield, and the season’s improved a little bit for them.

“I think the other thing that’s helped them is that they knew they were safe, which let them relax a little bit.

“Tim Smith and Wakefield seem to agree with each other. Tim seems to play his best football there.

“But you don’t beat those three sides I’ve just mentioned just because of one player. Their hooker’s quite crafty.

“Danny Kirmond‘s been a good player for a while. Taulima Tautai plays well, Pita Godinet, they’ve got plenty of players, some have been journeyman, but they always seem to turn up and play good games.

“Jarrod Sammut‘s back, and Jimmy Webster seems to like him where maybe Richard Agar didn’t.

“He’s a bit of a jack-in-the-box, and he can do anything on any given day. I’m not sure if Jarrod knows what he’s going to do, so he’s hard to coach against and hard to play against.”

Brown is also in no doubt that focus and commitment are key to his team having any chance of winning.

“We need 17 players who are 100 per cent committed to the cause,” he said.

“We need 17 players who are prepared to die for each other on any given day.”