FIVE tries in the space of 23 minutes - St Pat's showed just how damaging its attack can be when unleashing that barrage on Saturday to set up a 48-20 Peter McDonald Premiership win.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
or signup to continue reading
Hosts Lithgow Wolves had a sniff of a upset at Tony Luchetti Sportsground when scoring the opening try of the second half to make it a two-point game.
But as the Saints gathered and waited for the conversion attempt, captain-coach Zac Merritt laid down the law to his troops.
It was message received as the visitors rapidly changed the contest from an arm-wrestle to a try-scoring blitz.
"I think we knew that if we kept letting them play they'd score points. But as soon as we knuckled down, fixed ourselves, then we were right," Merritt said.
"The first 20-25 I thought we were good, points were coming easy. But then we fell asleep and let them back into it and like any team, they're going to take it.
"We addressed it again at half-time but then we let that try in and I just said to them 'We're not going to go tit-for-tat this week'. After that we really focussed on ourselves and we cut out the errors."
Being able to turn things around after a period of losing focus is something the Saints had struggled with prior to Saturday.
In round one against Nyngan the Saints at one stage conceded 16 unanswered points, while in the round three loss to Panthers Merritt's men surrendered a lead as well.
But Saturday's effort against Lithgow showed the men in blue and white are capable of maintaining intensity. The challenge moving forward will be to do it for longer periods.
As for Lithgow co-coach Jack Sullivan, he saw good mixed in with the bad as well.
There was good as the Wolves came from 10 points down to get on level terms in the first half.
Then there was the bad when errors gave the Saints too much possession in the second half.
"I think we just let ourselves down a bit with basic errors again, just dropping the ball, not completing our sets and giving them a few cheap penalties back up the field," Sullivan said.
"It's just that same roll on that's killing us.
"I think we need to try and take some positives out of that, some boys came back today and they attacked really well. Nath Redding, Elias Dukes, they've come back and added heaps to the attack.
"Eli Morris coming up from 18s was good, he offered us a fair bit of out of dummy half in attack, so we've got to take the positives.
"There have been heaps of positives every week, just the end result blew out a bit this time."
It was Sullivan that provided the first positive for Lithgow as he scored the opening try.
But the Saints responded in impressive fashion.
Firstly Merritt dragged three defenders over the line with him to score, then off the next set following a Hayden Bolam line break, the Saints were in again via Jackson Brien.
From there the visitors earned consecutive sets and laid on another try as Caleb Wardman crashed over.
The Saints' spine was firing. Bolam looked dangerous from dummy-half, fullback Ash Cosgrove forced errors with his kick-chase pressure, while the ball movement of playmakers Willie Wright and Noah Griffiths stretched the Lithgow line.
When prop Merritt was able to make covering tackle on Lithgow five-eighth Dylan Miles after he plucked an intercept and ran 24 metres, you knew things were going the Saints' way.
However, then came the switch off and Lithgow capitalised.
Firstly winger Elias Duke pulled off an old fashioned hit and spin to score, then prop Ryan Jervis surged through some flimsy defence. Cooper Egan nailed the conversion to lock it up at 16-all.
On the stroke of half-time a strong running Cooper Earsman scored his first PMP try for the Saints, but when played resumed it was Lithgow which began better.
The hosts enjoyed the first four sets of the half thanks to Saints errors and it resulted in Dukes' second try. That put his side within two of the lead at 22-20.
But that also fired up the Saints.
Merritt's side went from only completing two sets in the first 10 minutes of the second half to putting on an impressive attacking display.
A great ball from Bolam put Aaron Mawhinney over, Wardman picked up his second, then a sweeping back line movement created space for winger Matt Beattie to score.
Momentum was with the Saints and after Bolam pulled off a one-on-one strip which set up Cosgrove, the score had pushed out to 44-20.
There was one break in momentum when - following a head slam tackle - Lithgow's Jervis was sin-binned for the illegal play and St Pat's prop Luke Single for retaliating.
At that stage there was just over seven minutes left, so it finished as a 12-on-12 contest.
Lithgow did look a chance of pinching a late consolation try after a smart grubber from Redding helped force a line drop-out, but it was not to be.
Instead Griffiths took an intercept and ran almost the entire length of the field to ice the win.
Merritt was delighted with the way his entire side responded, but offered his playmakers special mention.
"Noah and Will, that was their best performance for us so far, they really started linking up well, talking well and directing things," he said.
- ST PAT'S 48 (Caleb Wardman 2, Ash Cosgrove, Matt Beattie, Noah Griffiths, Zac Merritt, Aaron Mawhinney, Cooper Earsman tries; Willie Wright 7 goals) defeated LITHGOW WOLVES 20 (Elias Dukes 2, Ryan Jervis, Jack Sullivan tries; Cooper Egan 2 goals)
Reading this on mobile web? Download our news app. It's faster, easier to read and we'll send you alerts for breaking news as it happens. Download in the Apple Store or Google Play.
