Eastmond is extremely highly rated at St Helens

St Helens thrashed Wakefield to record their 17th successive victory and move two points clear of Leeds Rhinos at the top of the Super League table.

Saints led 30-0 at the break with tries from Chris Flannery, Jon Wilkin, James Roby, James Graham and Paul Clough.

Wakefield, who slipped to their fifth straight defeat, responded with scores from Brett Ferres and Brad Drew.

But Saints proved too strong as Kyle Eastmond and Keiron Cunningham added some gloss to the scoreline.

Eastmond's score was the pick of the bunch, the 19-year-old showing awesome speed as he raced 80 metres for an intercept try.

606: DEBATE What did you make of Kyle Eastmond's display?

Roby then barged over the line and Graham scored after the Wildcats failed to deal with a high kick from Eastmond, who also kicked six goals.

Clough took Roby's intelligent pass to conclude the first-half scoring, with Eastmond converting all five tries.

The Wildcats finally got on the scoreboard as Danny Brough sent Ferres over - but it was a pass from Brough that Eastmond intercepted for his try.

Drew scored under the posts but Cunningham then crossed for Saints, with Matt Gidley converting.

St Helens coach Daniel Anderson on the performance of Kyle Eastmond:
"He kicked well and scored a nice try but there are plenty of areas where he can improve.

"It was easy to play in this game when you are 30-0 ahead at half-time.

"There are things he needs to do to maintain his level of intelligence over the course of the whole 80 minutes."

Wakefield coach John Kear:
"It was a very poor performance in the first 40 minutes. I will have to watch the DVD because the first half was embarrassing.

"When a team just brushes through it is simple one-to-one defence and that's very difficult to take.

"I need to look at things and there could be some major surgery before the next game."

St Helens: Wellens, Gardner, Gidley, Gilmour, Meli, Pryce, Eastmond, Graham, Cunningham, Hargreaves, Wilkin, Flannery, Sculthorpe.
Replacements: Roby, Cayless, Clough, Emmitt.

Referee: P Bentham (Castleford)