Saracens
SARACENS v EXETER CHIEFS: post match-related content here
By The Saracens
January 24 2024
Our game on Saturday against Exeter will be our last opportunity to watch Sarries (at least in a meaningful game) for almost 2 months. The next game (against Quins on 23rd March) is on the weekend of Palm Sunday – and we aren’t even into Lent yet! (A quick aside – feel free to skip the next bit)! I once gave up alcohol for Lent thinking it was 40 days – only to discover that that doesn’t include Sundays! Lent is more like 6 ½ weeks. And furthermore there seems to be much debate as to when it ends! I took it to be Easter Saturday when Sarries were playing Munster in the Heineken semi-final at the Ricoh. The SSA were offering free glasses of wine. It was a hot day in April (Easter is a highly moveable feast!) and I had a glass of warm Chardonnay. I’ve never tasted anything quite so good! But I digress.
There are pros and cons for this enforced midseason break. On the positive side, we don’t have to play any Premiership Games (well apart from this one) with most of the first team missing. It’s a chance for some well-deserved rest and recuperation for our (aging) squad and it gives some of our longer-term injured the chance to recover. On the negative side – what do we do with ourselves for the next 8 weeks? The team lose momentum and the younger players don’t get the opportunity to prove their worth against proper opposition.
Saturday’s visitors, Exeter Chiefs, gave us a thorough spanking in the season’s opener and Sarries will be looking to right that wrong. Exeter, in 4th, are 4 points above Sarries (in 6th) in the table having won 7 and lost 4 (as opposed to Sarries 6:5) so a victory should see Sarries climb above them. Exeter are the League’s top points scorers on 328 (40 more than Sarries on 288) and have conceded a miserly 231 (only Sale on 228 have conceded less). Sarries have conceded 241. Exeter are coming off a heavy defeat to Bayonne having drawn the short straw of the Sunday evening match so a 6 day turnaround. As we saw, Sarries turned it round in the 2nd half and produced a good win (in the end) over Lyon.
Exeter players Manny Feyi-Waboso, Ethan Roots & Henry Slade have been called up to the England Squad. All 3 have been playing very well and will certainly be missed by Exeter. Sarries will be missing 6 players: Jamie George, Theo Dan, Maro Itoje, Nick Isiekwe, Ben Earl & Elliot Daly. I think we should be able to call on Nick Tompkins and Andy Christie this Saturday.
Sarries’ injury woes are well-known and the loss of Jamie & Theo won’t help that however the scrum performance over the past couple of weeks has been encouraging. There is a slight possibility that Riccioni may be fit and possibly one of Woolfie or Pifeleti. If not I’m sure Hadfield will do his best. Exeter also have loosehead prop issues with the loss of Abuladze for the season. I would expect Tizard & McFarland (assuming he’s fit) to be the locks with Gonzales, Christie & Bille in the back row. The half backs should pick themselves: Van Zyl and Faz. Hopefully now his future plans are out in the open he will be able to relax and play in the way we know he can. I’d go with Hartley and Christie in the centres and Segun and Cinti (assuming Lewington isn’t fit) on the wings with Goodey at full back.
Exeter were able to welcome Devoto, Woodburn, and Hepburn back last week and Sio is said to be fit but Chiefs could lose Joe Hawkins following his red card on Saturday. Nevertheless Rob Baxter’s young side have done well this season although I think Henry Slade, who has been playing out of his skin, will be badly missed.
Both teams will want to go into the break with a win. It’s a big ask for Sarries but lets hope they rise to the occasion. But what we want to see is that Sarries’ mantra carried out on the pitch:- honesty, work rate discipline, humility. That should do nicely.
This weekend has been designated Pride Weekend. We are encouraged to put on our rainbow laces, match official shirts will carry a bespoke “rainbow” inspired version of the Gallagher Premiership logo, assistant referees will use LGBTQ+ rainbow flags and the post pads will also adorn the rainbow branding. Pitch-side LEDs will be creatively redesigned to include rainbow colours so the StoneX should look colourful!
It takes sunshine and rain to make a rainbow. There would be no rainbows without sunshine and rain. We’d all do well to remember that.
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2024:02:26:19:33:37 by Darraghgirl.
1 Logovi’i Mulipola
2 James Hadfield
3 Christian Judge
4 Theo McFarland
5 Hugh Tizard
6 Juan Martin Gonzalez
7 Andy Christie
8 Billy Vunipola
9 Ivan van Zyl
10 Owen Farrell (c)
11 Alex Lewington
12 Olly Hartley
13 Nick Tompkins
14 Rotimi Segun
15 Alex Goode
Replacements:
16 Sam Crean
17 Eroni Mawi
18 Ollie Hoskins
19 Ollie Stonham
20 Toby Knight
21 Gareth Simpson
22 Lucio Cinti
23 Tom Parton
15 Josh Hodge
14 Ben Hammersley
13 Zack Wimbush
12 Ollie Devoto
11 Olly Woodburn
10 Harvey Skinner
9 Stu Townsend
1 Alec Hepburn
2 Jack Yeandle
3 Marcus Street
4 Rusi Tuima
5 Dafydd Jenkins (c)
6 Lewis Pearson
7 Jacques Vermeulen
8 Greg Fisilau
Replacements:
16 Dan Frost
17 Danny Southworth
18 Josh Iosefa-Scott
19 Jack Dunne
20 Ross Vintcent
21 Tom Cairns
22 Charlie McCaig
23 Arthur Relton
Given that there are only 18 Premiership games this year it does seem a great shame that for both our games against Exeter this season we have not been able to pick our English internationals.
I really hope the boys are highly motivated and play with high intensity for this last hurrah before the 6 nations.
Fantastic to see Eroni back. If we don’t this our odds to retain the crown probably double.
The front row seemed to go well last week and Hadfield has been solid when I've seen him before.
We really need parity or close to at set piece otherwise it could get painful.
Chiefs seem barely impacted by call-ups. Slade is a big miss and F-W an electric talent but Pearson over Roots is arguably an upgrade. Hodge back to torment Sarries if we decide to kick deep and invite him to run it back.
They've a lot of big carrying options.
I don't know if we have a game to beat Chiefs but we certainly know the one we don't want to play (see the away game) so hopefully we have some "learnings" to apply!
Farrell simply has to step up and deliver the sort of performance we know he can. Billy finding last seasons form would be great too.
Hopefully I'll see some of the game through my fingers in the stands.
Good luck Sarries!
Quote:OldMarovian
Hopefully I'll see some of the game through my fingers in the stands.
Good luck Sarries!
321 caps v 20 in the starting XV and you're still the underdogs....🤣🤣😇
C'mon ruck you're pushing it now!
Quote:Not ManicheanQuote:OldMarovian
Hopefully I'll see some of the game through my fingers in the stands.
Good luck Sarries!
321 caps v 20 in the starting XV and you're still the underdogs....🤣🤣😇
C'mon ruck you're pushing it now!
that maybe, but based on our last 3-4 games we will sponsor at least 2 tries to Exe boys tomorrow so that evens up
Ninjafez - supporting Sarries and cleaning their signs since 2006!
Quote:Not ManicheanQuote:OldMarovian
Hopefully I'll see some of the game through my fingers in the stands.
Good luck Sarries!
321 caps v 20 in the starting XV and you're still the underdogs....🤣🤣😇
C'mon ruck you're pushing it now!
Always chuckle when caps/experience is used as the yardstick. Especially when our players seem to be both megabucks internationals and we can't possibly afford to have all this all star talent... and then the international windows roll round and suddenly they're unworthy of being anywhere near earning caps, are over the hill and aren't worth squat ;-)
It's all about form... Owen Farrell's 100 caps count for naught if he's going to offer opposition 14 points on a silver platter again!
I’m hoping it will be a lot closer than last time and its all official that Faz is now going, so hopefully it has freed his mind up.
Bit sloppy from us, couple of soft tries given away as per usual.
Given how big a pack Exeter were, I thought we did pretty well at the scrum as well. Great to pick up the 5 points and nil Exeter as it means we jump above them. If we beat Quins at the end of March then we will definitely be in the top 4 and in a good place to nick 2nd come the end of season.
I am assuming Eroni was not fully fit after the warm up as they literally gave him just the last 5 minutes!
Nice to see the ground pretty full as well and at times the crowd even made some noise!
Excellent seeing Farrell and Billy step up and it was a good team performance with max points plus nothing for Chiefs a great result.
Massive plaudits to Peel and the pack. The concern over the front row never materialised. Excellent shift.
As with SB I hope that Segun is ok. The break will work in his favour at least but he's been incredible the last couple of games and I hope when the Premiership resumes he's able to too.
The whole gameplan felt much more positive and even though nothing came of it I loved the tactic of cross-field kicks to our athletic backrows (something I've suggested before)
Lots of players with strong performances and even though Christie was great Hadfield would have been my MotM. 80 minutes as hooker, nailed his throws, strong at set-piece, contributed well in the loose and a couple of Trys. Would be interested if there's a chance of signing him beyond this season especially given Woolstencrofts injury issues.
Strong performance from Hartely too.
Brilliant to see the Farrell we are used to
The very last try harsh on Chiefs but otherwise the score a fair reflection of the game. Hodges great counter-attack and the beautiful support running aside they were very reliant on Sarries errors to get them into Sarries half. We were too to an extent tbf but I felt we created more chances for ourselves rather than relying on their mistakes which was good to see.
Hope the player and coaches enjoy the well deserved break guys and come back ready for the next 6 (plus?!) games.
It’s a testament to Exeter that even a three point win would have felt like a massive achievement. Hodge is sensational in broken play and has a good all round game
Hopefully some signings and resigning announcements over the 6N closedown period.
Hadfield take a bow, magnificent performance. Faz looking something like his best self, Billy with the try saving tackle, Christie everywhere and Hartley getting us over the gainline time and again. Hopefully Segun is ok be cause he is such a spark for us in attack and his kick chase was brilliant. Also Mulipola has been one hell of a last minute signing.
We’ve given ourselves a great shot at a run at the playoffs after the six nations, especially with all the lads coming back, plenty to be positive about!
Excellent performance from Hadfield who would have been Saracens 5th choice Hooker prior to the game?
Logo will always give his all and good on him for going 55 minutes!
Who is due back from Injury for the league restart?
Riccioni, Willis?
OT - good shout on Tizard, stood up really well to a big Exeter pack, one of his best performances too. I thought Theo M was great in defence too.
“The first operation was a normal plate across the break with screws,” he explained. “The second was them putting a big needle in my hip, taking bone marrow from it, and injecting it into where the break was in order to stimulate the cells to start producing more healing cells or whatever — I’m not a doctor!
“The third operation was another plate on the other side of the bone and a bone graft from my hip. They chopped off a bit of my hip, put it in where the break still was and screwed another plate over the top of it. That was agony, in fairness. That one really hurt, the others I wasn’t really bothered by.”
Successful hills are here to stay
Everything must be this way
Gentle streets where people play
Welcome to the Soft Parade
🌻🌻🌻
He's been in cracking form and it's brilliant seeing him getting a well deserved Scottish call up.
I know we all would love JMG to stay but honestly we have crazy quality signed up long-term in our backrow regardless with Earl, McFarland, Christie and some "welly" in T Willis.
Quote:Darraghgirl
Sadly had to miss this one and make do with some dreadful commentary from BBC Radio Devon. Apparently we have a decent centre called "Simpkins" and it's a shame he didn't make it into the Wales squad!
I've listened to Radio Devon a number of times and their rugby commentator makes it up as he goes along. He is the second most irritating person in Devon
Quote:siNBinQuote:Darraghgirl
Sadly had to miss this one and make do with some dreadful commentary from BBC Radio Devon. Apparently we have a decent centre called "Simpkins" and it's a shame he didn't make it into the Wales squad!
I've listened to Radio Devon a number of times and their rugby commentator makes it up as he goes along. He is the second most irritating person in Devon
Baxter or Rowe?
Table looks brilliantly competitive for the last third of the season.
Poor Sanderson. Feels like he must have tripped over a black cat whilst walking under a ladder and breaking a mirror this weekend
Quote:Barty IIQuote:siNBinQuote:Darraghgirl
Sadly had to miss this one and make do with some dreadful commentary from BBC Radio Devon. Apparently we have a decent centre called "Simpkins" and it's a shame he didn't make it into the Wales squad!
I've listened to Radio Devon a number of times and their rugby commentator makes it up as he goes along. He is the second most irritating person in Devon
Baxter or Rowe?
Baxter is at least 3rd
Ninjafez - supporting Sarries and cleaning their signs since 2006!
Successful hills are here to stay
Everything must be this way
Gentle streets where people play
Welcome to the Soft Parade
🌻🌻🌻
It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog.
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