St Helens head coach Kristian Woolf calls for Super League change

St Helens head coach Kristian Woolf has called for a Super League change with the increasing amount of injuries in the sport at present.

Saints have suffered greatly in 2022 with injuries with the likes of Mark Percival, Lewis Dodd, Will Hopoate and Tommy Makinson spending long spells of the season on the sidelines.

And, for Woolf, it’s been a season like he hasn’t yet experienced at the helm of the Merseyside club.

“It’s certainly a tough year, I know our injury toll is much higher than what it has been the last three or four years and when I look at most teams it seems to be the case too,” Woolf said.

“I’ve mentioned before that I think we do play too many games here. The number of short turnarounds and when you couple that with the number of games they play, we put our players in a position with more fatigue and a higher chance of injury.

“That’s where I think we are in the season at the moment. And, the ones that fall into the category the most are your elite players.

“They play every week, they play Super League ever week, every Challenge Cup game, every international game which can happen almost every year with very little recovery time leading into pre-season too.”

With another ‘Easter schedule’ around the corner, too, there is the potential for even more injuries to occur at the back end of the season.

For Saints, Woolf will welcome back Agnatius Paasi and Sione Mata’utia for their fixture against Hull FC on Sunday afternoon, but Curtis Sironen is banned after accepting a two-game charge from the Disciplinary Match Review Panel on Monday afternoon.

Tommy Makinson got through his return game against Castleford Tigers just fine last weekend, though Mark Percival is still a way off.