Premier League: St Helens 20-18 Leopards: A Saints thriller

St Helens coach Paul Rowley told BBC Radio Merseyside:

“It was very emotional for me and the coaching staff. First of all, overcoming injuries long before the game was a challenge that we had to overcome very quickly.

“The players had to not let that get in the way of what we were about and how we prepared and planned, and that we still had that belief, with people out of position, that we could persevere and stay resilient and get the result we wanted.

“It’s a long list of injuries and Johnny [Lomax] And Nene [Macdonald] Coming out so early in the game had a direct impact on the fluidity of what we wanted to do, offensively.

“As always, you learn more about people who face adversity, so buckle down and we’ll see where we go. Halfway through the season, we’ll have an influx of top players returning.

“Jonny has a broken arm, that will be confirmed, and Nene also suffered a knock to his leg, so we expect further investigations into this over the weekend or early next week.”

“Lee’s coach Adrian Lahm told BBC Radio Manchester:

“We won the game in the first half. Lee’s team last year would have taken advantage of that and carried on in the second half, but that was not the case.

“We were our own worst enemy, made a lot of mistakes and put ourselves under pressure against a very motivated St Helens team.

“In the second half the wind was very strong and we tried to lead by eight points at the end of the first half and they started and got the ball back.

“That was a huge play in the game – if we had gone into halftime down eight, it would have been a completely different ballgame, but it’s the little things we have to get over at this point.

“It’s hard to point fingers. We have a lot of new faces and it’s going to take some time.”