Confident Saints target first home win

St Helens coach Nathan Brown says his team go into Friday’s Super League clash with Wakefield in high spirits as they search to upset the rugby league betting odds for their first home win of 2013.

Saints produced their best performance of the season to secure a welcome win at Warrington last weekend. The key players stood up and performed for Brown and he will demand more of the same against Wakefield.

“We go in with huge confidence. Warrington are a terrific team and it was a good game of footy. It was intense for 80 minutes,” the Australian told the club’s official website.

“Our start was key to the victory and defensively it was good, too. They have a lot of very good players on their team and had a lot of opportunities on our line. The defence came up good and the challenge now is for us to come up again and do it again.”

It will be a different test for Brown’s men this weekend. While Saints have won three out of three on the road, they have been below-par at Langtree Park and are still awaiting their first victory.

Saints have struggled to make their new ground home since moving in at the start of 2012. Knowsley Road is proving a hard act to follow.

“There’s no logical answer to why we haven’t won at home – if there was we’d try and address it,” Brown added.

The visit of Wakefield is the first of back-to-back home matches for Saints, with Salford travelling to Langtree Park on March 22.

Those games will act as preparation for the big one, a Good Friday fixture at bitter rivals Wiga. A derby win would lay down a marker in Saints’ quest for a sixth Super League title.