Kyle set for Bath

ST HELENS coach Royce Simmons has revealed scrum–half and former Oldham St Anne’s junior Kyle Eastmond will join rugby union side Bath at the end of the 2011 Super League season.

The announcement, while still to be officially confirmed by either club, ends weeks of intense speculation linking the 21–year–old England international with such a cross–code switch.

Roughyeds fan Eastmond, who attended every Oldham RL game in 2007, will now see out the remainder of his contract with the Merseysiders before joining his new club.

Simmons said: “I think he will be going to Bath to play rugby union.

“He has spoken to the players and told them he had made a decision, a tough decision for him to make.

“He guaranteed us he was going to give us 100-per-cent for the rest of this season.

“The players all shook his hand and congratulated him, he’d come clean and said what he was going to do.

“That’s been weighing on a young bloke’s mind for a long time and we’ve got that out of the way now, we can carry on.”

Eastmond came through the Saints youth system after joining the club at the age of 13.

He made his first–team debut in June 2007 and established himself in the side the following year.

He scored in the 2009 Grand Final loss to Leeds, but missed last season’s Old Trafford showpiece, as well as the Four Nations Series, through injury.

He returned fit for the start of this season but his form in Saints' first three games has been indifferent and he was booed off by supporters after Friday's loss to Warrington.