SAINTS coach Kristian Woolf was happy with the way his side responded to last week’s defeat by Salford after his side hung on for a 20-12 win over Castleford.

Although they were in control for large parts of the game – and had a 20-0 lead at the hour mark - winger Bureta Faraimo’s late hat-trick of tries gave Saints a scare at the end.

Curtis Sironen, Morgan Knowles and Joe Batchelor had earlier crossed the whitewash, with Tommy Makinson kicking four goals.

Coach Woolf said: "I thought we had a lot better attitude right from the start.

“Our first half of footy was pretty good but we became a little bit scrappy in the second half and we had some errors that put us under pressure but we can’t overlook some good play from Cas too which meant we did a lot of tackling in the second half.

"There was an attitude in what we did right from the first set. You can always tell that through your defence – that is where you show your defence and how you have turned up.

“Our first set and in the early exchanges showed we were going after our work, after our tackles and were physical and we were putting them back under pressure and that is what we look like when we are defending at our best.

“I thought that was led by Morgan Knowles, Matty Lees and we were close to seeing Alex Walmsley back to his best.

“Curtis Sironen stood up again today and I thought he showed how hard he is going to be to tackle and he did that for the whole game and was great defensively as well.

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“On Wednesday he was touch and go but by Thursday he came out and trained with an intensity that said he was confident and right to go and that is how he has played."

Tommy Makinson made a return to the flank after missing the last four matches, and Woolf was happy to see the former Golden Boot slot back in there.

“Tommy is an influential player for us – sometimes people can forget how influential wingers can be.

"But he is important for us – and he is in our leadership group and he took about 15 plus carries there today and that takes some pressure off your forwards when you are coming out of your own end.

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“It is not just that he takes so many, but how he takes them – he also helps our defence, our kick chase and helps us to score tries.

“He was an inch or a centimetre off scoring a couple of tries today when on another day he would have scored and the first half scoreline would have looked bigger again.

“It is great to have him back.”

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Saints created a number of half chances in the first half in particular – and had some of those stuck they would have gone into the break with an even bigger lead and that could have altered the way the game panned out.

“The scoreboard brings pressure – if we had found a couple of those opportunities we would have had a bigger scoreline that would have put more pressure on the opposition.

“We did not quite nail them. Cas played well and hung in and made it hard for us to find points.

"With some of those tries we were not far off – but they were in there getting their hands around the ball and that is how you stop tries sometimes.

"We can’t not give Cas credit there and for the way they came back in the second half.

“Dan Hill there has copped a shoulder injury and that has made it hard for him to defend against a powerful winger – and that is why we had to make a replacement.

"He showed he was a good tough kid who was trying to get through that as well."

Woolf was happy to have his senior players back in their favoured positions with James Roby switching back from makeshift scrum half to number nine, and Jon Bennison’s switch to full back allowing Jack Welsby to partner Jonny Lomax in the halves.

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Woolf said: "We needed a bit more balance and James Roby is the best hooker in the game, so to have him in that position helps and Joey Lussick did a great job there today.

"Having blokes start in positions where they are comfortable I think that made a difference to us – and that is what we had to do this week.

"I also thought Jon Bennison was great – and he was under a lot of pressure against a very good kicking game from Danny Richardson.

“He put Jon under a lot of pressure in the first half with some difficult kicks in the sun which we don’t always have to contend with.

“He had a couple of errors at the back end that he will be really disappointed with – but for 90 per cent of his game he was outstanding and that is what he has to take away from it.”

After home debutant Danny Hill picked up a shoulder injury and came off late in the game, Woolf said they would look at what they have available for selection this week.

“We haven’t gone too many weeks where we are not changing someone – on our edges in particular. That is hard to contend with.

“You saw last week that you have to factor in a bit of fatigue there when there are so many chops and changes – with young blokes playing more than they thought they would at the start of the year and older blokes trying to put their hands up to carry a bit more load. And that becomes fatiguing.”