News: AP: Saracens vs Northampton Saints - Match Preview
By SAINT_aitch
September 23 2010
Northampton Saints travel to Vicarage Road, Watford on Sunday afternoon in Round Four of the 2010/11 Aviva Premiership season. SAINT_aitch looks ahead to what looks like a bruising encounter...
Well who’d of thunk it? 3 weeks in to a new campaign and Saints are sitting pretty on top of the Aviva Premiership. Now the optimist in me, and many of you will look at this past few weeks as a massive boost to our credentials, I mean, let’s face it, we have beaten the current Premiership champions, Tigers, we have finally broken that six year hoodoo against Quins at The Stoop, and rather healthily beaten the, at the time, only other unbeaten team in the league, Barf!
We should, however, look at the flip side of all of this. Tigers have yet to show the potential we all know they possess and will undoubtedly start to show by about Christmas time. Quins (as a Quins supporting colleague of mine so aptly put) can’t buy a win at the moment, and the Barf team that came a calling last week were missing a few of their key men. Even so, I like to think I am a glass half full kind of guy and the match last Friday evening at FG was easily one of the best I have seen Saints play for a long time and all bodes quite well.
SARACENS vs NORTHAMPTON SAINTS
Aviva Premiership: Sunday, 26th September 2010. 15:00
VICARAGE ROAD
MATCH PREVIEW
All the glory of the past three weeks has been a great feeling, but I can’t help thinking that if we can get a win this week, then we will have taken three major scalps in the first four weeks of the season but, not just that. All the speculation and doubt that we had in the days leading up to the Tiggers match, or away to Quins, or home on a Friday evening to the team who were topping the table added to the fact that we had to play down the hill in the first half pale into insignificance for me when compared to this week’s match.
We all feel it, frankly you may not be a real Saints fan if you don’t feel it. We simply must get one over on Sarries this week, on their patch, to make up for our dreadful results against them last season in the Premiership. Dammit this is the team that dared come to our fortress and beat us no less than twice in as many weeks!
Currently third in the league with only two wins from their three games due to their opening day loss to, what I believe is a very strong London Irish at HQ, Sarries have had what should have been an easier past two weeks than we had when they faced Sale at home and then away to Leeds but Sale hadn’t quite read the script and certainly tried to give the Watford team a run for their money. As expected though, Saracens tidied up the game nicely in front of their sun drenched fans and got their first win of the season 28:13 with tries for the seemingly unstoppable Schalk Brits as well as new boy David Strettle and other new signing Richard Wigglesworth’s boot being very accurate. Leeds away can be a bogey team for many visiting sides but not for our opponents this week. With a reverse of the weather conditions and a slow drizzle falling they slowly but surely dominated this match with another try a piece for Brits and Strettle but this time with Hougaard doing a pretty good job with the kicking.
Movers and Shakers at Watford
What have they got that we haven’t got then? They have suffered from a few big name departures over the summer with the likes of Glen Jackson and Justin Marshall retiring and Fabio Ongaro and Carlos Nieto leaving to join the new Italian Magners League team, Aironi.
Fair to say though that Dr Venter and ‘Big Ed’ are certainly doing a grand job in filling any gaps they have in an already strong team and it has been a case of recruiting quality over quantity with Scottish flanker Kelly Brown joining them from Glasgow to add to the signing of David Strettle and Richard Wigglesworth. It would also seem that they have found a very suitable replacement for Tiny in yet another capped South African, Deon Carstens who as a very agile but powerful prop, who has already made his mark by scoring a try at Leeds last week. Added to this the return of the former England captain, Steve Borthwick and Sarries are showing depth and strength throughout.
You have to admire the Saracens first XV team sheet. It really is fast becoming a who’s who of rugby with that strong leaning towards a Springbok second team with a sprinkling of other, now established players who are making a real nuisance of themselves, such as Kameli Ratovou in the centre and you have to believe that Sarries will be a match for any team and will be there, or thereabouts come the end of the season. It can only be seen as a credit to the strength of the Not-Not’s that they saw them off in the first game of the new campaign.
Rotation
Despite the fact that (or maybe because of it) the good Doctor has such a wealth of talent at his disposal, he has adopted a rotation system within the squad which I do not really know the mechanics of and to be honest, I am not entirely convinced that he does. Nevertheless, he has made a promise to all of his first XV along the lines of they are all guaranteed four starts this season. This could be at least one of the reasons behind the Sarries season opener defeat, and whilst I admire his commitment to his players and appreciate that there may be benefit in this tactic during the International call up’s for a team filled with Northern Hemisphere players, this may leave the Sarries with potential problems when it comes to match fitness, but more importantly player familiarisation with the players around him on the pitch. I am yet to be convinced this will work but two things are for sure:
1) Sarries do have strength in depth and none of their players should be taken lightly.
2) I am not going to attempt to pick a Sarries team for this weekend.
The venue
Yes, it’s back to Vicarage Road this season where we have not won since February 2004. Actually, up until recently, and I’m not sure if it is now resolved but Saracens were very nearly homeless as a dispute with Watford FC about some monies owed hit the news. Perhaps they should be renamed the Nomads!
So, like it or not, Saints fans need to make a real effort to get to this week’s game as we travel to Vicarage Road this week with what is probably our best chance to get one over on Saracens for many a year because, bless ‘em, they only get an average of 6000 turn out and we need to fill those seats.
As for the Saints team this weekend, well I believe we may have two worries for this match. The first is now becoming our weekly dilemma – Myler or Geraghty. Well, Shane has made his mark in the last two games and really earned his place even though a part of me wants to see Myler step up to the plate again and prove that he has not lost his ability to play a great game.
Is Chris Ashton broken? We saw him limp off the pitch last week and some of you may have seen the post match TV interview with the young speedster where he had his foot wrapped in ice and there have been reports of him leaving FG last week on crutches. This may mean that even if the wrapping were precautionary, that he may have missed some training and may be dropped for this match.
Other than that we have a great squad with so many people now proving their worth. Tom Wood is already showing he is a great addition to the team and him and Courtney seem to have a strong grip on line outs. Mujati is explosive and makes our entire front row such a force in the open, as well as the scrum. The centre combo of Jon Clarke and James Downey is proving unstoppable and young Lee Dickson is proving a thorn in the side for any opposition.
Team and score Predictions:
15 – Fodes
14 – Flash (or Joey depending on that foot injury)
13 – Clarkey
12 – Downey
11 – Brooce
10 – Tin Tin
9 – Dickson
1 – Tiny
2 – Dylan
3 – Mooj
4 – Long arm
5 – Daisy
6 – Dowson
7 – Tom Wood
8 – Sgt Wilson
It’s a big ask, but I reckon we can do it this time and I am going to go for a Saints win by 7.

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But then what do I know.
Great preview.
“Those who desire to give up freedom in order to gain security will not have, nor do they deserve, either one.”
Benjamin Franklin
Tetleys Block F E143
Keeping your scrum at bay, and whether Hougaard can get our backline going are key for us.
he should hopefully bear in mind that a scrum may wheel slowly due to pushing, but if it wheels fast it's invariably due to pulling/whipping.
1 Carlos Nieto is still around - it was Matias Aguero who went with Fabio to Aironi.
2 As far as I know we haven't had any dodgy headlines about monies owed to Watford FC - they themselves did have a navel-gazing run-in with their shareholders about repayment of some loans which could have become a knock-on problem for us but which seems to have been resolved.
(We do however await developments about the extension or not - by either party - of our lease.)
But a great preview otherwise and looking forward to a cracking game .... but I fear the weather may not help with an open running game!
The more of you who come the merrier - we need those seats filled!
Looking forward to a good match (just hope our Sarries have been practising this week!)
Saint til I die
Top of the League 2014-2015 Season
we are fourth in the league.
Good review, though.