Northampton Saints v Newcastle - ZP Preview
By Mark H
December 26 2003
On the fourth day of Christmas my true love gave to me four calling birds. Well, on the fourth day of this particular Christmas, I’m hoping that my true love will give to me four (or even five) ZP points as we go a-calling to the Falcons at Kingston Park.
Earlier in the season, Saints overcame the first half of your nightmares to win 33-20 and secure a try bonus as the big Falcons pack flagged in the latter stages, for what I described at the time as the most unlikely maximum point haul ever. At least that managed to banish most of the memories of our last visit this far north, back on Easter Sunday when Saints managed to throw away a comfortable 20-9 half time lead in the pursuit of a fourth try, and managed to lose the game 22-20.
Kingston Park is sold out for what has been billed (again) as the return of Jonny Wilkinson to Tyneside. This time, he might even get his boots on and get onto the pitch! With the Falcons team not being confirmed until Boxing Day, as they wait for fitness tests on the shoulders of Wilkinson and Hall Charlton, it’s very much guesswork as to what the line up will be, but I would guess that it will be something along the lines of:-
1. Ian Peel
2. Matt Thompson/Nick Makin
3. Marius Hurter
4. Stuart Grimes
5. Mark Andrews
6. Jon Dunbar/Epi Taione
7. Warren Britz
8. Hugh Vyvyan
9. Hall Charlton/James Grindal
10. Jonny Wilkinson/Dave Walder
11. Michael Stephenson
12. Mark Mayerhofler (c)
13. Jamie Noon
14. Tom May
15. Ben Gollings/Dave Walder
with the replacements coming from the unlucky parties in the Thompson/Makin battle at hooker (probably Makin), Dunbar/Taione on the blindside (probably Taione), Charlton/Grindal at scrum half (probably Grindal), and the odd one out of Walder or Gollings if Jonny does make it. I’d also expect to see prop (and expert lineout thrower) Micky Ward, Saints’ bete noir Garath Archer, and Joe Shaw making up the bench.
Falcons have flattered to deceive this season, currently lying in eighth but being only nine points off the top three. They’re the only side to beat Bath all season, but they also managed to lose to Sarries at home on the first day when they didn’t start playing until after the interval. They’ve pushed Wasps close twice, but ultimately lost out by two missed Walder conversions at the Causeway Stadium, and by going to sleep in a gale at home. They’ve got the highest ZP score this season, with the 56 points they scored against Rotherham, but as Rob Andrew said afterwards, they could have scored eleven or twelve tries rather than the seven they got.
So, the talent is obviously there in the side, but they seem to have that trait again that has plagued them since they won the championship in 1998 - inconsistency. On their day (and as they have proved), they can beat anybody. They can also make their supporters wince in agony as they fail to put any sort of form together and lose to teams that they, frankly, are better than. They have possibly the most dangerous set of backs in the league, and certainly one of the biggest packs, so why aren’t they in a better position than they are at the moment?
Well, this season they have lost games they could, and in some cases should, have won. Five losing bonus points in the first twelve games, only missing out on points in their losses at Bath and FG, are an indication of just how close they have been. Turn those five results into wins, and they’re second in the league. Even allowing for them not winning all of those games, if they had won the games which were lost as a result of missed kicks, then they would still be on a par with Saints, Irish and Wasps. And that’s where they’ve missed their talisman.
Newcastle are not a one man team - far from it. Where they have missed Jonny Wilkinson this season is the knowledge that if they get a penalty in the opposing half, then it’s ninety per cent certain that the ball will be going through the posts. Add another five of them in each game, and you’re eighteen points down before you start. And I also understand that given the correct service, that he’s not bad at drop goals either…
Falcons will welcome back four players from the Twickenham party last weekend, with Marius Hurter (or as described by Alastair Hignell on his website column this week, Larry Asserter) set to rejoin the front row and hoping to add another try to his effort at the Gardens, and Hugh Vyvyan to probably start at number eight, whilst Epi Taione (who appeared as a replacement on the wing for the New Zealand Barbarians) and Ben Gollings (all the way to Twickers for one minute at the end of the game) both hoping to make the starting fifteen.
Most of the attacking threat will come from the electric three-quarters. It’s no secret that I am a big fan of Mark Mayerhofler at inside centre, as he always seems to have enough time to set up good options for those outside him, as well as possessing that crucial yard of pace that can take him over the gain line, and when he has three players of the pace and skill of Michael Stephenson, Jamie Noon, and Tom May outside him, you can see where the danger is coming from.
May is having the season of his dreams, having been converted (against his better judgement) from inside centre to right wing after failing to cross the try line in all twenty of his ZP games last time around. Well, this time he’s only crossed in three, but scored seven tries in those three, including two hat tricks. Add another treble against Valladolid in the Parker Pen Challenge Cup, and you have a man in top form. With Hall Charlton also having cemented his place as first choice scrum half, the back line has a settled look about it, and a feeling of a more than competent unit.
In the pack, I thought that Jon Dunbar excelled in the game at the Gardens, showing the ball carrying skills that Epi Taione usually shows but adding a bit of extra weight to the pack (not that it particularly needs it). Warren Britz is always a danger on the blindside, and the result will depend a lot on whether he or Foxy manage to get to the respective fly halves and disrupt their game plan.
So what of the Saintly line-up? Well, it would have been hard to drop any of the fifteen that performed so well against Tigers on Saturday, so Smithy didn’t! Our new Tongan prop, Tevita Taumoepeau was available for the first time, but has not been selected, and the one enforced change, of course, is Sharky. He’s back in for Daws at scrum half, but then that’s hardly a hardship with the way that Sharky is playing in recent weeks. Certainly when he signed late last season we all hoped that he would have an impact whilst the world’s best scrum half was away, but he’s not got to the stage where Smudger has to choose between the two purely on form (which of course is the way it should be). I’d put him in my top three Saints players of the season so far without a doubt.
That’s not to say that losing Daws (and indeed Ben) to injury will not hamper Saints – I for one was looking forward to seeing the experiment of Daws at centre to see whether it could add that missing extra dimension to our attacking game. I also know that some of the Falcons supporters were looking forward to seeing him playing there too, believing that he would get “creamed” by the Mayerhofler/Noon combination. Not too sure about that, because players with that amount of footballing ability should be able to turn their hands to producing competent performances in most positions, but it would have been interesting to see Daws play against a zestful combination. Ben will be a great loss, of course, but it’s another chance for Clarkey to show how well his skills are developing – I thought that he had the best game of his fledgling career last time out.
So the team announced on Wednesday morning is:-
15 Nick Beal
14 Bruce Reihana
13 Chris Hyndman
12 John Leslie (captain)
11 John Clarke
10 Shane Drahm
9 Mark Robinson
1 Tom Smith
2 Dan Richmond
3 Robbie Morris
4 Rob Hunter
5 Mark Connors
6 Andrew Blowers
7 Darren Fox
8 Grant Seely
16 Steve Thompson
17 Chris Budgen
18 Jon Phillips
19 Mark Soden
20 Johnny Howard
21 James Brooks
22 Paul Grayson
(which forced a re-write of this preview, because I got the team spot on but the bench completely wrong!). Grays could have a big part to play – if he gets the chance of any more sixty metre penalties this time around, let’s hope that they go an inch higher and over the bar.
The arbiter for all that is fair on Sunday was supposed to be one Stephen Lander Esquire, but much to everyone's relief, a late change on Wednesday meant that the job has gone to Ashley Rowden (much to everyone's relief that it isn't Lander - it could never be relief that we've got his deputy!) . It must mean that Bath are away this week, as he has made The Wreck his permanent home this season. The one thing you can say about him is that he will keep smiling through the game, which given the weather forecast could actually mean that it becomes a frozen smile by the end of the afternoon. And i do believe that he's promised to buy chips for everyone at each call of "time off" as well...
Saints have won eight of the thirteen Premiership meetings, and have only lost two of the last ten, both of those defeats being at Kingston Park, and both being Jonny assisted. There is talk in Newcastle of if they want to be a top five team, they should be winning at home to Saints. Turning that around, if Saints want to be a top three team, they should be winning at Newcastle, however difficult it may be.
As for Sunday, forget the Birds, forget friendships (they can be placated in the bar afterwards), I want the points. Saints to win another tight one.