{"id":424856,"date":"2026-02-14T05:29:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-14T05:29:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/424856\/"},"modified":"2026-02-14T05:29:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-14T05:29:09","slug":"st-helens-conduct-slammed-as-jon-wilkin-makes-spectacular-claim-about-treatment-of-club-legends","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/424856\/","title":{"rendered":"St Helens’ conduct slammed as Jon Wilkin makes spectacular claim about treatment of club legends"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Super\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

St Helens legend Jon Wilkin has given a brutally honest review of his former club following their round one defeat to Warrington Wolves, though he\u2019s targeted their off-field conduct as opposed to their on-field showing.<\/p>\n

The Red Vee were dismantled by Sam Burgess\u2019 men, as they suffered a 24-14 loss in what was Paul Rowley\u2019s first Super League game in charge of the club<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Following that loss, which some could say was unexpected, former Saints forward Wilkin commented on the current state of the club, and how it has gone about his business in the past 12 months.<\/p>\n

The 42-year-old believes the club have acted wrongly towards two club legends in Paul Wellens and Mark Percival, with both men mistreated in his opinion.<\/p>\n

Speaking on Sky Sports after the Saints defeat, Wilkin argued: \u201cThe club needs change, and there will be change at a top level in the club.<\/p>\n

\u201cI look back to last year, the Paul Wellens sacking and how that was dealt with.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey ran Paul down to the death and then told a legend of the club that he\u2019s going, when they knew he was going in summer.\u201d<\/p>\n

Expanding on that, Wilkin claimed:\u00a0\u201cThey told him if he got to the Grand Final, he would have a job, and I don\u2019t believe that to be true.\u00a0I believe that there was already decisions being made to bring in coaching.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jon Wilkin tears into St Helens<\/p>\n

Of course, these are only allegations made by Wilkin, and St Helens have neither confirmed or denied whether his version of events is correct.<\/p>\n

The 2006 treble winner also claimed that an agreed contract for centre Mark Percival has now \u201cgone missing\u201d \u2013 with that claim coming at the same time that the centre is reportedly being on the outer.<\/p>\n

Wilkin revealed: \u201cMark Percival signed a contract in August last year that\u2019s gone missing. All of a sudden now he\u2019s on the out.<\/p>\n

\u201cThings need to change at that club if that\u2019s how they\u2019ve operated and look after their people, and it\u2019s not good enough in any work place. I hire people and that\u2019s simply not good enough.<\/p>\n

\u201cMark Percival is a man who\u2019s put his body on the line for the club, and has been one of the legends of this club, and I just think we need to look after their people better.\u201d<\/p>\n

Giving Saints credit, Wilkin did explain how things at the Red Vee are changing for the better, and it comes at a much-needed time, given that such a historic club has now gone over three years without reaching a major final.<\/p>\n

\u201cThings are changing and Paul Rowley is a smart guy\u201d, said the pundit, adding: \u201cHe will come in as a head coach and will change things.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut the club, I think, systemically needs some change in that department. I think the club just needs a shake up and Paul Rowley is the first part of that.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s lots going on behind the scenes.\u00a0They do some fantastic things.\u00a0The club are an amazing club. It gave me so many amazing years in my life. But things change, don\u2019t they?<\/p>\n

\u201cThe expectations of how we look after people in life changes.\u00a0And I expect better.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"St Helens legend Jon Wilkin has given a brutally honest review of his former club following their round…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":107683,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-424856","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-rugby","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/424856","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=424856"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/424856\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/107683"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=424856"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=424856"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=424856"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}