Saints Vs Tigers - Friday Night

[FKAS]

NORTHAMPTON SAINTS vs LEICESTER TIGERS
Gallagher Premiership, Round 12
Friday 21 March, 2025
cinch Stadium at Franklin’s Gardens
Kick-off: 7.45pm

15 George Hendy
14 James Ramm
13 Fraser Dingwall (c)
12 Rory Hutchinson
11 Tom Seabrook
10 Fin Smith
9 Tom James

1 Emmanuel Iyogun
2 Curtis Langdon
3 Trevor Davison
4 Temo Mayanavanua
5 Tom Lockett
6 Josh Kemeny
7 Tom Pearson
8 Juarno Augustus

Replacements:
16 Henry Walker
17 Tarek Haffar
18 Luke Green
19 Alex Coles
20 Chunya Munga
21 Henry Pollock
22 Jonny Weimann
23 Burger Odendaal

Not available for selection:
Emeka Atuanya, George Furbank, Sam Graham, Archie McParland, Toby Thame, Ollie Sleightholme, and Robbie Smith.

STARTING XV for the good guys

15 Freddie Steward [101]
14 Adam Radwan [2]
13 Solomone Kata [34]
12 Joseph Woodward [23]
11 Ollie Hassell-Collins [38]
10 Handré Pollard [44]
9 Jack van Poortvliet [86]
1 Nicky Smith [14]
2 Julián Montoya [69]
3 Joe Heyes [154]
4 Cameron Henderson [55]
5 Harry Wells [213]
6 Hanro Liebenberg [122]
7 Tommy Reffell [128]
8 Olly Cracknell [57]

REPLACEMENTS

16 Charlie Clare [114]
17 James Whitcombe [64]
18 Dan Cole [335]
19 Côme Joussain [13]
20 Emeka Ilione [38]
21 Ben Youngs [328]
22 Ben Volavola [7]
23 Izaia Perese [11]

Kata at 13 is probably a bit of a risky move, can see him getting isolated in defence.

Haffar and Seabrook to play against their future employers?

[FKAS]

Freeman and Mitchell getting their rest weeks in. Martin and Chessum still recovering from injury.

Saints stacking the bench for the second half. Some weight and impact in those replacement forwards.

[fivepointer]

Coles cant even get a start after sitting out the 6Ns? Chance for Lockett to follow up his good A team showing.

Very pleasing to see Woodward starting and Ilione on the Tigers bench.

[Banquo]

Coles cant even get a start after sitting out the 6n

He was injured at least half of it

[Puja]

Kata at 13 is probably a bit of a risky move, can see him getting isolated in defence.

Interesting that Perese's on the bench. I'd've had Woodward/Perese, but I think Cheika's got Kata inked into one of those centre slots for some reason, so it's interesting that when there's only one slot available, it's gone to Woodward.

No Carnduff on the bench is a bit sad - had hoped he'd be covering lock as I'm not really sure about Joussain.

Puja

[FKAS]

Kata at 13 is probably a bit of a risky move, can see him getting isolated in defence.

Interesting that Perese's on the bench. I'd've had Woodward/Perese, but I think Cheika's got Kata inked into one of those centre slots for some reason, so it's interesting that when there's only one slot available, it's gone to Woodward.

No Carnduff on the bench is a bit sad - had hoped he'd be covering lock as I'm not really sure about Joussain.

Puja

Yeah agreed with that.

Joussain adds more weight to the pack but that's about the only way he's better than Carnduff. Carnduff is better in the backrow but can do a job at lock and around the park he's miles better, particularly at the breakdown. However, given Saints have loaded two locks onto the bench maybe it's not the worst idea to have a big lock there.

I'd imagine Woodward and Kata will interchange, Kata probably defends at 12 but attacks at 13 whereas Woodward will act as the secondary playmaker at 12 but defend at 13 where's more nimble and less likely to get exposed by Saints pacey backline. Having Kata and Perese play half a game each and knowing it in advance so they can just go all out and empty the tank is an interesting idea.

[twitchy]

Cracking start.

[FKAS]

Saints lacking intensity early doors and Tigers look fired up. Shame Pollard hasn't got his kicking boots on with only one conversion from three so far.

[FKAS]

Kemeny was an inch away from a red card there. Lucky boy.

[FKAS]

Freddie Steward with a jackle turnover. Take a picture of that you probably won't see another.

[Oakboy]

Saints look awful - mistake-ridden. Tigers are exploiting space craftily. JVP is really back on song. Woodward has had some classy touches.

[FKAS]

Saints cavalry off the bench has arrived and white line fever from Seabrook costs them there. Tigers need to keep the intensity up as this isn't done yet.

[FKAS]

Ref's doing his level best not to penalise Saints scrum this game. They've been on the ropes for about two third of the scrums so far but it's always "play away".

[FKAS]

If Hendy stops over running those passes Tigers are in trouble.

[FKAS]

Not sure what on earth Henry Pollock thought he was doing trying to run the ball from a tap penalty 5m from his own line. Goes nowhere then throws an awful pass to no one that falls to Charlie Clare who takes the gift and gleefully doves over.

[FKAS]

Saints nilled at home.

[Puja]

That was a hell of a lot better result than I was expecting! Thought we were excellent in the first quarter before the rain started coming down and, once we got that lead, we could just put Saints under pressure as they tried to force it with a slippery ball.

Saints were dire, and we did definitely get the rub of the green, but we looked like we used our second pre-season very wisely indeed.

Puja

[fivepointer]

Saints were inexplicably awful. Tigers didnt have to work that hard for their points or in regaining possession.

An odd game, pretty unsatisfying for the neutral.

Do think Woodward looks a fine player. Seems composed, makes good decisions with a good skillset.

[FKAS]

Saints were inexplicably awful. Tigers didnt have to work that hard for their points or in regaining possession.

An odd game, pretty unsatisfying for the neutral.

Do think Woodward looks a fine player. Seems composed, makes good decisions with a good skillset.

As Puja says, once the rain started coming down the ball was not easy to hang onto and that really killed Saints chances of coming back. Tigers three tries in 15 mins or whatever it was just blew Saints away and then the weather turned and Tigers were always going to be better in an arm wrestle.

OHC and Radwan were fantastic on the kick chase, made pinning Saints back far easier. OHC took a couple of nice balls in the air off Hendy as well. Poor Hendy will want to forget that game as quickly as possible, wasn't his night.

Woodward is just a classy player. Opens up the Tigers attack nicely. Best centre on the pitch last night. Offload to set up the Radwan try and the tap tackle when it looked like Saints were going to break and score two outstanding involvements.

[Oakboy]

Saints were inexplicably awful. Tigers didnt have to work that hard for their points or in regaining possession.

An odd game, pretty unsatisfying for the neutral.

Do think Woodward looks a fine player. Seems composed, makes good decisions with a good skillset.

Agree with all that. As FKAS says, Woodward was the best centre on the pitch.

I have thought highly of the Saints management team previously but this was a shocking effort. Why would you not start Pollock? He put more effort into his short time on the pitch than others did in the whole 80. Of course, he was trying too hard in his desperation at being a late part of that performance. At least he looked ready to compete anywhere on the pitch.

[FKAS]

Saints were inexplicably awful. Tigers didnt have to work that hard for their points or in regaining possession.

An odd game, pretty unsatisfying for the neutral.

Do think Woodward looks a fine player. Seems composed, makes good decisions with a good skillset.

Agree with all that. As FKAS says, Woodward was the best centre on the pitch.

I have thought highly of the Saints management team previously but this was a shocking effort. Why would you not start Pollock? He put more effort into his short time on the pitch than others did in the whole 80. Of course, he was trying too hard in his desperation at being a late part of that performance. At least he looked ready to compete anywhere on the pitch.

Tigers bench impact has largely been absent this season. Was pretty much the same last night bar Ilione and one good carry from Perese. I suspect Saints fancied their 6-2 bench split with Coles, Munga, Pollock etc to come on and up the intensity and take the game away from Tigers. They did up the intensity but the gulf in physicality levels was too much for them to effect. Actually Coles was a bit disappointing. Pollock and Odendaal added good impetus.