Premiership: Five things we learned as Saracens shine
Premiership rugby’s Saracens’ fast and loose play is producing very attractive rugby and Irish finally get their long-awaited win. Sale, though, struggled against undefeated Leicester while Bath were valiant in their loss. Here’s five things we learned from the weekend’s Premiership action.
Silky Saracens
Saracens backed up their rampant 71-17 victory over Bath last week by putting 40 past Wasps in their 56-15 win yesterday. Max Malins scored four tries as the winger bagged two hat-tricks in two weeks.
Saracens looked to be the pragmatic, composed team upon their Premiership return but just less than a quarter of the way through the season, their confidence on the field is seeing them adopt a fast, loose game plan which suits their well drilled squad.
Tagged as title favourites in September, they’ve done nothing to dispel that case.
Bath plug leaky defence
Bath’s crushing 71-17 defeat at home to Saracens last week piled the pressure onto head coach Stuart Hooper. The last fixture he’d have wanted next was Harlequins away.
However, in their 31-17 defeat to the champions on Saturday, Bath’s senior players stepped up and the squad put in an impressive performance.
There is no shame losing to Quins in their current form and Hooper’s squad will have taken home a lot of positives. Next week sees them up against an injury-ridden Wasps in a game Bath really will be targeting. It’s a must win for Hooper, too.
Jaws of defeat
Ahead of the season, many would have put Sale Sharks in their top four. The outfit impressed last season and were well drilled under Alex Sanderson.
However, at the hands of unbeaten Leicester Tigers, the Sharks fell to a 19-11 loss. On Saturday. Though their opposition were always going to be difficult to overcome, Sale offered little in attack and were let down by their discipline, where George Ford punished them off the tee.
Sitting in eighth after six matches, there’s no time to panic for the Sharks – after all, they’ve inflicted Harlequins’ only loss this season.
Glossy run of form
Gloucester’s slogan in the George Skivington was ‘trust the process’, and now on an unbeaten run of four Premiership matches, the Cherry and Whites may have found their winning formula.
By no means are the West Country club the finished product, and their 29-10 win over Newcastle on Saturday proved that, but they’re heading in the right direction.
Gloucester of old are famed for their dominating packs and driving mauls, and under former Wasp lock Skivington’s leadership, they’re using that weapon to great effect once more.
The side, however, have a weak period where they ship points and lose focus – to keep their position in the top six, where they currently reside, the club will need to cut out their disciplinary errors.
Twelve times a charm
Last week City PM spoke of the promise at London Irish – all the jigsaw pieces but without the ability to put them together.
That changed on Saturday, however, with a superb 33-21 win over Exeter Chiefs at Sandy Park. Irish used their forwards to punch holes in the unexpectedly leaky Chiefs defence before exploiting those gaps with their star backs.
Irish needed this desperately, and now that the bogey of not winning is off their back, they’ll need to push on at home to Bristol in the Premiership on Saturday.