St Helens’ CEO defends club’s recruitment after recent accusations of “penny-pinching”

Chief Executive Officer Mike Rush has defended St Helens’ recruitment over the past few years after recently being accused of “penny-pinching”.

Rush has labelled the recruitment as “good” when appearing as a guest on Sky Sports’ The Bench podcast, hosted by Jenna Brooks and Jon Wilkin, with Wilkin among those recent critics.

Former St Helens captain Wilkin pinpointed recruitment as one of the major reasons why Saints have struggled in recent years and had a slow start to 2025.

Speaking ahead of St Helens’ clash with Catalans, Wilkin argued that there had been a “slow disintegration of that championship-winning team over the last couple of years”, before labelling recruitment as “poor”.

He went further, stating: “It’s been based on penny pinching and making deals with players who are substandard and not good enough to be at a club like this.

“They’ve brought in overseas players who simply are cheap in the marketplace. There’s far too much reliance upon youth and bringing young players through.”

CEO Mike Rush has now defended the club’s recruitment to Wilkin on his podcast.

St Helens CEO argues recruitment has “been good” as long-term plan outlined

“Not guilty, it’s been good,” Rush responded when asked if he pleaded ‘guilty’ to the suggestion that the recruitment had “not been great over the last few years”.

Wilkin then named Waqa Blake, Moses Mbye and Konrad Hurrell as overseas recruits who have underperformed, thus backing up his argument that recruitment hadn’t been good enough.

“Unfair on Konrad and Moses,” was Rush’s response, as he added: “Overseas players are harder to get than ever before. Your days of getting a Jamie Lyon or a Matt Gidley are much much more difficult.

“When we’re playing well and the team is full of confidence, I think that Moses Mbye or Konrad Hurrell, who is out injured, do add a lot to our team.”

He did admit: “We’re always going to get it wrong whether it’s an overseas player or not, you take risks and you gamble. What you have to keep in context is that it’s a salary cap sport and you’re putting certain numbers on player’s heads that you believe they’re worth.

“I understand your question but it’s much more detailed than picking a certain player and saying ‘is he playing well or not?'”

Rush then used Waqa Blake, who has since left and joined Championship side Bradford Bulls, as an example, explaining: “Waqa Blake played in an NRL Grand Final, that doesn’t necessarily make him a great player but for what we had available in our cap and what we valued the player at, it was worth a chance to do.

“It’s moneyball-esque in order to get the best value and our club differs in that we probably rely more on British players to be at the forefront.”

Defending that, he stated: “Ours is a long-term model and what we’re about is trying to get it right over a sustained period of time. It’s only two years ago that we were half a minute away from being in a fifth straight Grand Final.”