Long night in the fog

Long: former Saint

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Sean Long made a dream return to Knowsley Road as Hull claimed a shock 32-12 victory over St Helens.

The former Great Britain scrum-half spent a trophy-laden 13 years at St Helens but departed for Hull in the off-season.

The Black and Whites failed to make the play-offs last season and arrived as big underdogs at the home of the perennial Grand Finallists.

But they were good value for their win in the Merseyside gloom - visibility was at times down to less than 20 metres as the fog descended.

The game was in doubt at one stage, but Hull will be grateful the officials took a chance as they got their new campaign off to a flying start

Both sides made understandably tentative starts in the conditions, preferring to play safety-first rugby.

Breakthrough

Long created the first half-chance of note, his grubber kick well fielded in front of his sticks by Saints full-back Paul Wellens.

The hosts hit back and successive penalties close to the Hull line should have resulted in the opening score.

But the fog may have played a part as Saints shipped the ball out wide and Ade Gardner found himself confronted by Jordan Tansey, who forced the winger into touch with a fine smothering tackle.

Next it was the Airlie Birds' time to threaten and Richard Horne would have scored had he been able to claim his own grubber kick behind the Saints line.

The breakthrough finally arrived after 25 minutes and Long played a key part.

Quick hands moved the ball across the line in front of the St Helens posts and a clever dummy run from Craig Fitzgibbon gave Long the space to fire a pacey pass into the arms of Willie Manu, who slid in unopposeed.

Danny Tickle added the extras and Hull's confidence visibly grew (or at least as much as visibility was possible on a night such as this).

They were over again two minutes from the break, as Epalahame Lauaki shrugged off four challenges to score a fine try from 15 yards out.

Crucially, St Helens should have hit back right on the hooter as James Roby made the break and looked to have put Scott Moore over, only for Kirk Yeaman to knock the ball loose to maintain the visitors' 12-0 lead at the break.

Tickle's boot stretched that lead by two just four minutes into the second half after Keiron Cunningham was penalised for not standing square.

Long's moment

Long's big moment arrived on the next set of six, a long-range try after a fine off-load by Tickle and break by Horne, with Long on hand to take the pass and dive over the line.

David Graham crashed over from close range but Lauaki showed terrific strength to hold him up over the line, much to the prop's frustration.

The match was as good as settled on the hour mark when Tom Briscoe shrugged off a tackle, emerged from the fog and raced 80 metres in just one boot to score.

Saints did finally manage to open their 2010 account 17 minutes from time after Tansey was sin-binned for a professional foul and Matt Gidley squirmed his way over.

A brilliant pass from Jon Wilkin opened up the Hull defence again and Chris Flannery touched down, Kyle Eastmond cutting the deficit to 26-12 with 10 minutes to go.

But even then Hull had the final word late on, Yeaman touching down Craig Fitzgibbon's hack forward.