Saints 42 Castleford Tigers 14 SECOND-PLACED Saints twisted the Tiger's tail with a vengeance in this seven-try super show in midweek.

Such a performance must have boosted their hopes of a first-ever Grand Final appearance, and extended Saints' winning run to eight matches.

Two-try captain Chris Joynt earned the John Smith's man-of-the-match award and the Hattersley Engineering accolade went to Paul Newlove, while points-machine Sean Long kicked seven goals from as many attempts and scored a try.

Saints were off to a flyer within four minutes when Newlove intercepted Nathan Sykes' pass to race 90 yards to touch down, while Castleford were denied a try when Ian Tonks was adjudged to have made a double movement.

With Apollo Perelini and Julian O'Neil laying a solid platform up front, Joynt stepped in with two brilliant individual efforts, before Paul Atcheson was put on report following a tackle on Francis Maloney which resulted in the injured Tiger leaving the field.

Long's grubber kick to the posts saw Tommy Martyn plunge over, and 33 minutes had ticked away before Castleford replied when Aaron Raper and Dean Sampson sent Brad Davis over for Danny Orr to convert.

Paul Sculthorpe notched Saints' fifth try on the stroke of half-time to extend the lead to 30-6 and, on the restart, Atcheson was sin-binned for a professional foul as Cas made their extra man count with a try by John Wells. Saints' response was immediate as Freddie Tuilagi went over at the scoreboard corner in Exocet missile fashion; Michael Eager 'made' Tiger's last touchdown for Darren Rogers, and Martyn and Steve Hall did likewise for Long.

Sampson was shown the yellow card for dissent at Sean's try, while an incident involving Flowers on Joynt and was placed on report.

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