Boks score for Sharks in win over Saints
PREMIERSHIP REPORT: Sale Sharks held strong in defence and continued their remarkable record against Northampton Saints at the AJ Bell Stadium with a well-deserved 22-10 victory.
The home side went in front early on through the boot of Robert du Preez and things got better when Chris Ashton ran in the first try of the game.
Cobus Reinach’s pass was picked off by the former Saints man, who gathered it and ran in unopposed while du Preez added the extras.
Northampton got their first points of the afternoon through Dan Biggar’s penalty while Lewis Ludlam scored from close range and a successful conversion levelled the game at the break.
Sale pulled away in the second half when Rohan Janse van Rensburg and Akker Van Der Merwe both crossed over to secure a 22-10 win and move up to fourth in the table.
Sale Sharks Director of Rugby Steve Diamond said: “I’m very pleased. I think if we had kept hold of the ball in some other circumstances, we probably could have got a little bit more out of it.
“Against a side that have been playing well all season and scored more tries than anybody, I think we managed to look after them in defence quite well.
“We know they’re good in the first two or three phases and they scored that first try. We just missed a one-on-one tackle but apart from that, I think we handled them quite well.
“I told them to keep our discipline high. We were poor in that today and our turnovers second-half were poor. We had opportunities to maybe score other tries and we didn’t take them.”
Northampton Saints director of rugby Chris Boyd said: “We got sucked into an arm wrestle that we didn’t want to have.
“To be fair to them, they forced us into spaces we didn’t want to go into.
“It certainly wasn’t the game we wanted to play and they were on the front foot and dictated it to us.
“Guys were spooked into poor execution and poor decisions under pressure – we’ve just got to get better at that.
“It was a very frustrating day at the breakdown and when you can’t get any ruck speed it changes the picture quite a lot.
“We need to go back to some really key little parts of our game and make sure we get it right.”
The scorers
For Sale Sharks:
Tries: Ashton, Janse van Rensburg, Van der Merwe
Cons: R du Preez 2
Pen: Du Preez
For Northampton Saints:
Try: Ludlam
Con: Biggar
Pen: Biggar
Teams:
Sale Sharks: 15 Simon Hammersley, 14 Chris Ashton, 13 Sam James, 12 Rohan Janse van Rensburg, 11 Byron McGuigan, 10 Rob du Preez, 9 Faf de Klerk, 8 Daniel du Preez, 7 Tom Curry, 6 Jono Ross (captain), 5 James Phillips, 4 Bryn Evans, 3 WillGriff John, 2 Akker van der Merwe, 1 Coenie Oosthuizen.
Replacements: 16 Curtis Langdon, 17 Ross Harrison, 18 Jake Cooper-Woolley, 19 Matt Postlethwaite, 20 Ben Curry, 21 Will Cliff, 22 AJ MacGinty, 23 Denny Solomona.
Northampton Saints: 15 George Furbank, 14 Tom Collins, 13 Matt Proctor, 12 Rory Hutchinson, 11 Taqele Naiyaravoro, 10 Dan Biggar, 9 Cobus Reinach, 8 Teimana Harrison (co-captain), 7 Lewis Ludlam, 6 Tom Wood, 5 Courtney Lawes, 4 Alex Moon, 3 Ehren Painter, 2 Mike Haywood, 1 Alex Waller (co-captain).
Replacements: 16 Sam Matavesi, 17 Francois Van Wyk, 18 Paul Hill, 19 Api Ratuniyarawa, 20 Mitch Eadie, 21 Connor Tupai, 22 Piers Francis, 23 Ahsee Tuala.
Referee: JP Doyle
Assistant referees: Anthony Woodthorpe & Wayne Falla
TMO: David Grashoff
Report by @premrugby
