1. Saints collected their first piece of silverware since 2014 after finally wrapping up the League Leaders Shield. After being such runaway leaders at the split – followed by a blip in August – there was a sense of anti-climax given the mood for weeks has simply to be ‘let’s get this one out of the way’.

But nevertheless the fact remains that Saints deserve this honour for the being the best, most consistent team over 30 Super League rounds.

The league table does not lie – and they sit top of the pile for a reason. It Is worth reflecting how far Saints have come in getting back to finishing top.

At the start of last season – and yes 2017 seems such a long time ago in rugby years - Saints had won just five of their first 13 games and were by no means guaranteed a place in the Super 8s.

Given Ben Barba has been the only significant external addition from outside that is some improvement in this squad.

2. How do you celebrate a League Leaders Shield win? Saints were criticised by some for their calm, cool and some would say muted response to lifting the shield on Friday night.

This has always been the Saints way in all previous shield triumphs – and it is not down to being blasé, arrogant or disrespectful.

It is one of those situations where until there is a wider and deeper appreciation of finishing top within the game the winners will be mocked as ‘small time’ for celebrating and criticised as ‘arrogant’ for not.

There is a massive case for making this a more valued comp – but it incredibly hard trying to do that now given that the Grand Final is everything.

And that is obviously the reason why the Saints players were not jumping for joy under the fireworks. They are focused on finishing the job and their eyes are focused purely on getting to Old Trafford and winning that.

3. Much had been made of Hull FC’s injuries going into Friday’s game, but Saints themselves had eight first team regulars missing which meant a very young side taking the field including debuts for James Bentley and Jack Welsby, and a first start of the year for Jack Spedding.

It was a promising first match from Bentley, who was Championship Young Player of the Year in 2017. He caught the eye and constantly looked for work in an industrious 80 minutes.

After spending the year getting game time on dual registration at Sheffield, it was a nice for the home fans to finally get to see him in action.

4. Friday night saw a bit of history made with Jack Welsby becoming the first player born in this century to make his senior debut. He played the last 10 minutes, put himself about, walked off with a medal…..and then made us all feel even older.

5. The last two weeks have been significant in the sense that Saints are beginning to get the ball into the hands of their strike weapons again. Mark Percival has bounced back into form and took his tries well.

But it was especially pleasing to see Regan Grace grab a brace, one showing determination from a Barba pass and a long-range effort which got the crowd out of their seats.

Grace has had quiet weeks - and is not alone in that - but every time he gets the ball in anything like space he shows that there is no substitute for pace.

6. Friday saw the voting through of changes to do away with the Super 8s, return to one-up, one-down promotion and a restoration of the top five.

The top five was always the best system to reward the teams doing best on the league table.

And it kept interest alive in the table and then built a proper play-off system that had knockouts for the weakest but a second bit for the top two.

Now it is all sorted, we can now let the players do the talking and help build the game back up after a damaging public row.

There has been a lot of criticism over how this has all been conducted – and it has not been ideal.

But sometimes you need to have arguments aired in public, have a sounding board and allow the wider rugby league world to react.

And it may be that sometimes you have to go public to break any logjams in the resolving a dispute.

Either way, everyone has to be glad it is all over and we can back to trying to build crowds, standards, sponsorship and media profile which will ultimately put the game in a much stronger position to negotiate the next television deal.