At halftime at the Jungle, Castleford Tigers will be kicking themselves that they are 6-0 down to St Helens eight days after the Saints won the World Club Challenge in Australia.
The Tigers caught St Helens cold, perhaps exploiting the jet lag in the Saints side. A good move down the right released Jake Mamo and it looked like a certain try as he fed the ball back inside for Niall Evalds but the fullback dropped it.
Mark Percival was struggling after trapping his leg beneath a tackle. It allowed the Tigers exploit the situation kicking a 40/20 and they looked destined to score through Alex Mellor shortly after who was given an offload in space. But Percival managed to summon the energy to get over and deny the second-row.
Tee Ritson was inches away from debut delight as he was given the ball by Konrad Hurrell and he acrobatically dived for the corner but his knee touched the ground outside the pitch before the ball was grounded.
Mamo was showing his magic today as made a brilliant break down the edge again tip toeing down the edge but once again the Saints couldn’t translate it to points. The same happened again a few minutes later as he jinked through the heart of the Saints defence but didn’t find Jack Broadbent in support.
A minute after Mamo’s latest break, Saints stretched the Tigers and Jack Welsby showed good strength to power over.
That made it 6-0 at the break but it could have and perhaps should have been different and that was the view of Kyle Amor who described Mamo’s execution after breaks as “shocking” on Channel 4.
He said: “All the good work Jacob Mamo has done today but the last part of his detail has been shocking.
“Mamo has done brilliantly, but he runs out of ideas for the third break. He is looking for support. It’s not there and then he decides to flick the pass and it is not well executed as a result.”
After Mamo’s error, it was Jack Welsby who powered over. Amor was full of praise for him:
“He is 21 years old but has done it all already. He might as well quit now. A quality player, he was out of this world last week. It is only his 86th performance for St Helens and has done everything in the game.”
This led Mark Wilson to suggest that the Tigers would be disappointed in themselves:
“You said Castleford would be happy with their start but I think they will be disappointed. They will think they should be in front.”
Amor then added: “Execution has let them down.”
At halftime, Huddersfield Giants star Ash Golding said of Mamo, “I think he will have a say in this game.”
Former Leeds Rhinos women player Danika Priim said: “He almost looks afraid to get tackled. He is making unnecessary passes which are going to ground.”