St Helens “punished” by officials’ calls as Jon Wilkin calls out ‘game-changing’ decisions

St Helens were “punished” by some refereeing decisions last night in their 32-18 loss to Warrington Wolves, according to pundit Jon Wilkin.

The Red Vee were in the game at half-time despite numerous mistakes that gave Warrington easy points and field position, however, a Wire side without both Marc Sneyd and George Williams were able to put Saints to the sword in the second-half.

Whilst the performance left a lot to be desired, with Paul Wellens even conceding that his side looked “disjointed”, Wilkin pointed to a five-minute period in the second-half when some major decisions went against St Helens.

Approaching the hour mark with the score 20-14 to the hosts, St Helens saw Mark Percival’s try correctly ruled out with the centre having put his knee dead behind the in-goal before grounding the ball, however, he was pulled back when chasing that ball and that went unpunished.

St Helens then lost a Captains Challenge as Jack Welsby contested the call that Lewis Murphy had blocked Josh Thewlis’ run, a decision that seemed incredibly harsh and was immediately punished. From there Warrington scored through Rodrick Tai and the game stretched to 26-14.

St Helens on the “bad side of a lot of calls”, claims Jon Wilkin

Had St Helens been given the penalty for the pull on Percival then it could have been a whole different story and that was what Jon Wilkin argued as he brought the officiating into questioning.

“They got a lot of things wrong and didn’t help themselves in the first half, it was self-inflicted,” Wilkin admitted, before setting forth his argument.

“But they were on the bad side of luck and the bad side of a lot of calls. Wow, did they get punished by the refereeing tonight!

“The fact Mark Percival doesn’t get the ball down but got pulled back. It’s a penalty. (Lewis) Murphy being adjudged to have run off (Josh) Thewlis is a nonsense decision. Toby King might have touched that ball in the first half for the Ashton try.

“We bang on about moments matter in games but there was a five-minute period in the second half where St Helens got nothing, and Warrington got everything.”

Further on in the analysis when a debate raged over whether Jonny Lomax should play and if he’d make a difference, Wilkin hit out at the officiating again.

He said: “I’ll still say this, the game changed on a couple of key decisions. The video referee missed a clanger (penalty for St Helens on Percival ‘No Try’ and then they gave the decision for the Captain’s Challenge (against St Helens).”

NO TRY FOR ST HELENS! ❌

It’s SO tight but the video referee rules Mark Percival’s foot was on the dead-ball line when the ball was ground 🦶🤏 pic.twitter.com/HbBN0PgD6K

— Sky Sports Rugby League (@SkySportsRL) April 24, 2025