Men versus boys. In fact, it was men versus pre schoolers.

I get that fans of teams who will never win SL were dying for Catalans to win (just check out the Warrington page on Facebook as an example) but it’s not going to happen. This is why I had Catalans no where near winning on the predictions thread. It’s between Saints and Wigan this year.

It says something when Saints can wait until 55 minutes to bring on a hooker who would walk into every other super league team

Stop Start game, what was Tomkins doing in the first quarter, he was acting as though he was the referee and talking to the touch judges all the time instead of getting on with the game.

Be interesting to see if anything gets done about the gouge Dudson was kicking off about.

Saints were class tonight. The defense is just brilliant and the pack is superb. Not the most classy of Saints sides and they won't score as many points as previous teams competing for trophies, but they will take some beating.

Catalans on the other hand are just dumb. They clearly went into the game with an anti-rugby mentality. Holding down, constant niggling, time wasting throughout and constant game management attempts that just did nothing at all to benefit them. They've clearly practiced these dark arts in pre-season too. The way when they get a penalty, the ball will always be passed to someone else, even if the kicker has it. So when the ref is ready for them to take it, the ball has to be found. I suspect the intent was to keep the score down rather than win the game, but still you're never going to win if you aren't trying to win.

Catalans are a massive side with some real aggression and tried to intimidate and bully Saints. But you can't do that with this Saints side. There are too many players in there that love that side of the game. It plays into the hands of Knowles, Batchelor, Mata'utia and Walmsley.

I'd question McNamara if I was in charge of Catalans. Clearly out of his depth with no clue on how to approach games. They need to give Pearce the responsibility and tell Tomkins to just play rugby. He spends most of the game complaining and appealing and desperately trying to milk penalties. I lost count of the amount of times he got involved in a tackle when Catalans had the ball and wound up on the floor in the ruck appealing for a penalty. He's supposedly the best player in the game over here but did nothing tonight positive tonight, tell him to play rugby.

Big props to Hurrell too. Played the full 80 minutes and was a constant threat, not only in attack, but defense and in bringing the ball back in his own 20.

Hes going to be the signing of the season.

Couldn't see anything in it on the replays, looked as though the Saints defence put the marker down from the very first tackle, Dudson didn't like the mauling and retaliated that was why he was dispatched to the bin confirmed by the touch judges. Think it was Batchelor who was near his face, but Woolf post match said its just not their game and the disciplinary will look at it.

Just check out your username as an example?

I just can’t wait for the Channel 4 coverage I’m sick to death of Bill Arthur.

Saints look the real deal. Struggling to think of any passengers in that team at all, nice mix of youth and senior players, plenty of academy talent, a relatively settled side who have been playing together a while now.
Headaches for Woolf when Grace is back fit too.

Very good opening performance from Saints, would have been even more if they possessed a kicker.