Salford head coach Paul Rowley told BBC Radio Manchester:

“To beat top teams you need to defend well and we did that. We played the game in the right half of the field for us, which was a challenge we accepted, as they have 54% of possession generally. We went in at 54% at half time.

“Dominating possession means you dominate territory and we were led by [Marc] Sneyd, who is a talisman and the architect of everything good. We deserved the win in a good game.

“People laud [Tim Lafai] as one of the best centres in Super League so nobody wants their best players dropping out but if I’m honest nobody batted an eyelid. We’re pretty chilled with stuff like that.”

St Helens head coach Paul Wellens said:

“He (Sneyd) is always going to have an impact on the game and you’ve got to try your best to prevent that, but he’s had too much of an impact around his kicking.

“I thought we were going to win it – I always back this team to defend a game out.

“But we lost a bit of connection with our edge defence a couple of times, which is uncharacteristic, and we conceded two tries from kicks, which is disappointing.

“I thought we had done a really good job in the second half to get back into the game and it was disappointing to get opened up at the end for their last try having worked so hard to get back in front.

“Three of the four were, I feel, soft tries. Eighteen points should be enough to win any game of rugby but we got a few things wrong defensively today.”