Wasps v Northampton Saints - Zurich Preview

By Mark H
May 14 2004

It’s déjà vu all over again on Sunday, as for the second season running Saints, having secured third place on the last day of the season after a hard fought home victory have to head down to Wycombe to play the Waspies for a place in the championship final against a team from the south west.

It’s déjà vu all over again on Sunday, as for the second season running Saints, having secured third place on the last day of the season after a hard fought home victory …sorry, my little joke!

The similarities don’t end there. On 4th April, Saints came off the back of an ultimately disappointing win over a London side and travelled to the Causeway to play a Wasps team with one eye on their biggest match of the season just a week later in the Heineken Cup. I pray that’s where the similarities end though, for Saints came away that afternoon battered, bruised and badly beaten by a superb home performance.

There are major differences though, both to last season and six weeks ago. This time, Saints travel not with an unexpected semi-final like last season, but with it being as part of the season plan. This time, Saints travel not to play a Wasps team running into top form, but one coming in on the back of successive defeats. This time, Saints travel not to play their full strength team, but a unit with key personnel either missing or not quite at full fitness. The loss of Craig Dowd, surely the best loosehead (with the exception of Tom Smith) playing in the Premiership, would be a big miss at any time of the season; to lose him weeks before the biggest match in your history, as next Sunday’s little tussle with Toulouse is, is a massive blow. No matter how good his replacement Tim Payne is, that little (!) bit of experience that he’s picked up in collecting 60 All Black caps is worth something when the really big clashes come up.

Now to lose one immense player may be considered unfortunate. Add to the list Simon Shaw, Rob Howley and Trevor Leota, all of whom are rumoured to be doubtful for Sunday’s shenanigans, and you can see Warren Gatland’s dilemma. Does he concentrate on that Heineken Cup final, and the chance to enter the pantheons, or does he throw everything into defending his title, risk injuries, and possibly lose out on both? For what it’s worth, I expect all three players to feature at some point on Sunday, and probably from the start too, as if I were a Wasps supporter I would want to still be fighting on two fronts come four o’clock.

Having said that, as a Saints supporter, I’ll be quite happy to see all of the three missing, particularly Shaw, who has just been outstanding this season, and unfortunately for us that was never more apparent than in that game back in April. He’s got the acknowledgement of his peers in being nominated for the PRA Player of the Year, and if you add that to his nomination for Zurich Player of the Year as well, then he’s obviously been doing something right. And to put it in perspective, England won a World Cup without him…

Trevor Leota, love him or hate him, makes Wasps a better team when he’s in the team, simply because it’s quite difficult to stop a nineteen stone midget with a turn of speed. That might be doing him down, but it is one of his assets, that he hasn’t got the height that could get caught in a tackle and can therefore barge into the nooks and crannies left around rucks and mauls, as well as being wide enough to ensure that it has to be a proper tackle to stop him. And as for Rob Howley…well, I must be honest and say that I’m really not sure about him going on the Lions tour next summer, simply because I get the feeling that Woodward will be looking at Peter Stringer as his first choice, but he has had a superb season and has provided that bit of high quality, as with Shaw and Leota, during the long weeks when the other internationals were absent.

Dowd, Shaw, Leota and Howley. All played through the World Cup, and all now unfit when Wasps really need them. Coincidence? Over reliance? With Howley’s understudy Peter Richards also missing from last week’s home defeat to Tigers, it will be interesting to see the Wasps line up when it is announced. One thing is for certain, any team that has the quality and promise of someone like Ayoola Erinle as backup in the centres have strength in depth - he’s one player I’d love to see in a Saints shirt.

As you’d expect in knockout rugby, Saints have gone for the strongest available side, with welcome returns to the starting XV for Mark Tucker, Paul Grayson and Bruce Reihana. All three, together with the eight men good and true in the pack, are vital to any success that Saints can get. Back in April, the 10-12 axis of Shine and JL was repeatedly exposed by Waters, Abbott and Worsley, and that can’t be allowed to happen again, otherwise it’s game over. The Saintsmen selected are:-

15 Bruce Reihana
14 Nick Beal
13 Ben Cohen
12 Mark Tucker
11 John Clarke
10 Paul Grayson (co-captain)
9 Mark Robinson
1 Tom Smith
2 Steve Thompson (co-captain)
3 Tevita Taumoepeau
4 Matt Lord
5 Mark Connors
6 Andrew Blowers
7 Darren Fox
8 Grant Seely

Replacements:
16 Dan Richmond
17 Robbie Morris
18 Jon Phillips
19 Mark Soden
20 Johnny Howard
21 John Leslie
22 Shane Drahm

We all have a fair idea of what the gameplan is going to be, all we can do now is hope that it is good enough. Nearly 4,000 Saints supporters will be making the trip, with the allocation almost snapped up ad well as some judicious use of the excellent ticket purchasing facility on the Wasps website. It’s the biggest away following for many years, the most comparable being the convoy down the M1 to Watford for the Saracens cup tie in 2000. The game was a classic, with the correct team winning 34-32 in the last seconds.

Personally, I don’t care if it’s a classic or completely mediocre, all I care about is an away win. The thought has gone through my head all week that it’ll be harder to win the semi-final than it will the final. If we do get there, Chris White will be refereeing both games, which will at least mean that should we be successful, the team and coaching staff will have an idea what Mr White is looking for (and missing).

Prediction - the game will be on Sky and Barnes will talk rubbish. Any more than that I’m not committing to, it’s too close to call.

RTS boys, RTS.