GP: Northampton Saints vs Bristol Rugby - Preview

Since then, both the Saints and Bristol have qualified for the quarter-finals of their respective European competitions as one of the best runners-up. Saints now travel to Biarritz (or San Sebastian) in the HEC after beating Borders and losing to Biarritz, while Bristol travel to arch-rivals Bath in the ECC after losing to the Dragons and beating Bucharesti. Bath v Bristol should be an interesting one as the teams meet for the fourth time this season. Bristol has won all three so far, and a 4-0 clean sweep would be rather special for them.

Also in the news recently, Bristol Rovers have received planning permission to re-develop the Mem into an 18,000 seater stadium (unfortunately with no terraces). This means that the rugby club, as tenants, face 18 months without anywhere to play – a ground-share with Bristol City at Ashton Gate seems most likely. No idea where Rovers are going to play! The plan is for much of the cost to be recouped via integrated student accommodation and a hotel.

The most worrying aspect of this move is the fact that the famous pasties aren’t available at Ashton Gate, and may well not feature in the new stadium due to the usual bland homogenised catering concessions. Call the whole thing off!

Current capacity is about 12,000, and average attendance in the league this season has been 10,600 (excluding the 21,200 who watched the win over Bath at Ashton Gate), so if Bristol continue to perform at their current level, higher capacity will be essential.

Attendances are well up on last season, so presumably there are a lot of fair-weather supporters out there (metaphorically speaking of course – anyone who saw the Gloucester and Bath matches on Sky will have seen sell-outs when it was persisting down), and any drop-off in performance might well put attendances back down – in their relegation year, attendances were distinctly poor.

Last week, Richard Hill gave his mid-season presentation to the fans – these are apparently very informative sessions. He is apparently planning to announce 7 new players in the coming weeks – a tight-head prop, a loose-head prop, a back row player, a scrum half, a fly half, a wing and a full back. Once these have been signed for next season, he doesn’t expect any major signings this time next year.

Apparently the club is in a very good financial state, and it has been my understanding that Bristol have been well under the salary cap since they were promoted, so their recent success has presumably enabled and encouraged the club to invest a bit more money in the playing staff. Hill also said that he will try and mix the team up a bit to give squad players more experience. The club are also looking for a kicking coach.

As for the game, Shaun Perry’s injured ribs are healed and he’s back ahead of the 6 Nations. Fly-half David Hill is ill and misses out this week, so fellow Kiwi Neil Brew plays in the centre and Jason Strange is at fly-half. Brian Lima also gets an outing on the wing. While Lima probably isn’t as fast as he used to be, he still hits hard. Craig Morgan drops to the bench from fullback in favour of Josh Taumalolo. On the bench there are some unfamiliar names – Linklater and Hohneck (Kiwi hooker and lock respectively) are fairly recent signings while Pennycook is an Academy lock/back row who has played U18 for England.

On the Saints side, Steve Thompson end a troubled week by sitting out with an injured neck, while Pat Barnard celebrates his call-up to the England Saxons by also missing the game through injury. Fellow Saxon Dylan Hartley starts at hooker. Given that Bristol are strong in the scrum, Tonga’uiha, Hartley and Budgen might have a testing time in front of the Sky cameras.

Paul Diggin, Robbie Kydd and Ben Cohen all play musical chairs – Diggin goes from wing to fullback, Kydd from fullback to centre and Cohen from centre to wing…

Form and league position predict a win for Bristol, but personally I saw some reasonably positive moves against a Biarritz side who, let’s not forget, are one of the best around. Even if we don’t win, a good performance is absolutely essential, as are some tries from the backs.

Northampton Saints: P Diggin, S Lamont, R Kydd, 12 D Quinlan (capt), B Cohen, C Spencer, M Robinson, S Tonga’uiha, D Hartley, C Budgen, D Browne, C Short, P Tupai, D Fox, D Browne

Reps: TBC