Alex Walmsley's delight after St Helens capitalised on 'cheap' Warrington Wolves tactic

Alex Walmsley has revealed the thinking behind St Helens’ tactic of pushing at scrums - and making sure opponents don’t get rewarded for the “wrong mentality.” The England prop scored a bizarre try in last week's thrilling 12-10 victory at Warrington Wolves.

Super League leaders Saints were 4-0 down in the 20th minute when they shoved at a scrum after Warrington had put the ball in just 10m from their own line. Daryl Clark was caught by surprise at the back of the scrum and fumbled with Walmsley breaking off to hack on and score in surreal circumstances.

Contesting scrums has rarely been seen in rugby league for decades. But the Super League champions have started doing it when opponents have held the ball in the back of the scrum, delaying and dummying trying to lure defenders into straying offside.

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Walmsley admitted it was a planned attack.

He said: “It was although we obviously weren’t planning on scoring off it. I just think it’s something that’s crept into our game of trying to get a penalty like that.

“We know they do it quite a bit so, we tot that up and, when we can, we get a push on. It came up quite nicely tonight: I don’t think they did it again.”

The 32-year-old said the hope is that sides do stop using the negative ploy with Saints coach Kristian Woolf also criticising the tactic in the post-match press conference.

“I think so as it rewards the wrong mentality for me,” added Walmsley. “We’re really happy with how it came out and to get a try was a bonus.”

At 18 stone plus, Walmsley - who led the shove - is a useful weapon to use in such instances and it’d be no surprise if he’d like a return to old-fashioned scrums.

He joked: