MAGICAL MARCUS
Premiership’s youngest centurion sinks Sale with dazzling display
MARCUS SMITH laid on a dazzling show to celebrate becoming a record-breaking Premiership centurion, with a try, a perfect sevenout-of-seven kicking return and the man-of-the-match award in Salford yesterday.
this was a significant result for a Harlequins side whose fortunes had fluctuated wildly in the first month of this season. Coming off the back of a home defeat by leicester, tabai matson’s side managed to stop Sale’s thunderous momentum, beat them at the AJ Bell Stadium for the first time since 2015 and prevent them from returning to the top of the league.
Before the game, it was the Sharks who were seven from seven — in all competitions — but by the end Smith claimed that flawless tally with two conversions and five penalties. it was a fitting way to bring up his hundred, as the youngest player to reach the threefigure mark in league appearances, at the age of 23 years, 251 days.
the england fly-half gave his club a boost and his country too, at the end of a weekend which must have left national coach eddie Jones hiding behind the nearest sofa, desperate to avoid more bad news. not only did Smith stay in one piece, he shone with a mature performance which was acclaimed by his coach matson.
‘today was the best example of him showing that he can play test match rugby,’ said matson. ‘He kicked all his goals and kept the pressure on by keeping the scoreboard ticking. every time he goes away with england, he comes back a better player because international rugby is different.
‘He’s tracking in the right direction in his international career and the fact that he’s 23 and has played 100 Premiership games already is just ridiculous. He’s going to break a lot of records.’
Smith himself expressed satisfaction with an important win in notoriously hostile territory. He said: ‘We haven’t had much success here, it’s a tough place to play, but we dug deep and got the win.’
the visitors’ no 10 set up the opening try by nick david with a clever cross-kick under pressure, then nailed the conversion from an acute angle, off a post. Sale hit back through Sam James and a Rob du Preez penalty, but Smith responded with a penalty of his own then a try before the break as he carved through a gap after igniting the raid from a lineout.
in the second half, he just kept finding the target when chances came along, as Sale’s discipline unravelled. Smith, danny Care and tommy Allan gave Quins the canny game management which their opponents lacked.
When Will evans flattened tom Curry with a blockbuster tackle late on, forcing a knock- on, it summed up the balance of power on the day.
Asked what had led to his team’s demise, Alex Sanderson, Sale’s director of rugby, said: ‘decisionmaking in attack and our discipline in defence, which gave them easy points. We’ve been operating with an unflappable calm and we strayed away from that today.’
Before the match, Sale wing tom Roebuck was promoted to the england squad for the upcoming training camp in Jersey.
the 21-year-old from Chester has been summoned by Jones after Henry Arundell and Jonny may joined a growing casualty list in a damaging london irishGloucester game on Friday night.
Arundell is understood to have aggravated a foot injury and may has a suspected elbow dislocation which could lead to another long lay-off for the 32-year-old.