Justin Holbrook: We want to put on a good performance for our home fans

St Helens coach Justin Holbrook aims to deliver a satisfying performance for the clubs home supporters on Friday night.

Hull FC have had a turbulent few weeks with heavy defeats against Wakefield and Warrington casting a dark shadow their 2018 campaign.

St Helens themselves have stalled in recent weeks but after clinching the victory away in Perpignan against Catalans, Holbrook is looking to deliver the goods for the home fans.

“Hopefully we get a good crowd – we haven’t played well the last couple of home games so that would be nice to put on a good performance for our home fans.”

When asked about injuries within his squad he replied:

“I’m not sure yet there’s a lot of blokes with bumps and bruises, we will just have to see how they improve this week”

“If they’re ok they’ll play, if not then we will do what we did last week – we didn’t play benny and robes and if we don’t have a few lads that won’t recover in time for Friday, then we won’t play them either.”

St Helens were without Barba and Roby in their win in France – the former of which, Barba, seemingly set to return to the fold against Hull FC.

The Saints now set their sights onto the Black and Whites. The visitors improved their display against Castleford Tigers last week but still seem to lack the quality to win against fellow top sides.

Holbrook believes that the Hull FC that played last week will turn up to the Totally Wicked Stadium, rather than the team that conceded 70 and 80+ points to Wakefield and Warrington:

“Definitely planning the one from last week, they’ve still got plenty of players and it was an off night for them at Warrington so I’m not too worried about that performance, the main thing is we’ve got to worry about ourselves.”

On the prospect of finally securing the League Leaders Shield, Holbrook stated:

“If we’re good enough to win Friday then it guarantees that and it’ll be nice to be rewarded for being the most consistent side after 30 rounds which is great and something we would be happy to achieve and collect”

However, he admitted that there are bigger goals on the horizon:

“But the biggest prize is Grand Final day at Old Trafford in our sport, [it’s] a bit different to football but I don’t want to down play it – it’ll be great to achieve.”

St Helens v Hull FC kicks off on Friday at the Totally Wicked Stadium at 19:45