WARRIORS FILL BOOTS
WORCESTER director of rugby Gary Gold heaped praise on half-backs Ryan Mills and Francois Hougaard after the Warriors pulled off a shock victory over champions Saracens.
Mills kicked all of the hosts’ points with his eight penalties from nine attempts, securing him a club record for points in a Premiership fixture.
His partnership with former South Africa scrum-half Hougaard kept Saracens firmly on the back foot, with the pair’s astute kicking penning the visitors in their own half.
Gold said: “Francois and Ryan were the generals out there, as our objective was to not let Saracens have opportunities in our own half.
“Hougaard has world-class ability. I’m not surprised the opposition target him.
“Ryan is only filling in at No.10 but we don’t want to chop and change the team too much.”
The win took Worcester five points clear of Bristol at the bottom of the table, but Gold said: “This was all about showing the fans that we care. As long as we showed fight, the result wasn’t as important.”
Out-of-sorts Saracens still scored the only tries, through Chris Ashton and Schalk Brits – but director of rugby Mark McCall admitted: “We were very disappointing.” LEICESTER won their first Aviva Premiership game in more than two months and moved up to fifth.
Luke Hamilton, Adam Thompstone and new signing Maxime Mermoz touched down for the Tigers, who also added a penalty try, with Freddie Burns and Owen Williams sharing kicking duties. Billy Burns, Freddie’s younger brother, landed all Gloucester’s points
The Tigers, whose form cost director of rugby Richard Cockerill his job last month, played with new-found energy. 1PM
Bath 32 N’thampton 30 EDDIE JONES admitted his side dodged a bullet after Elliot Daly’s late winner put them top of the Six Nations and gave them 16 wins in a row.
Daly struck with four minutes left to break Welsh hearts just a week a f t er En g l a n d squeezed past the French.
That is two from two and with Italy up next, Aussie Jones is eyeing another title to add to last year’s crown.
Joe Launchbury and Courtney Lawes tackled themselves to a standstill, Owen Farrell ran the show and Jack Nowell defended like a demon.
England might have burgled this win but Jones has turned them into a team who never chuck in the towel. “I think we have used all our get out of jail cards,” said Jones.
“There were great things in the first 20 and last 20. In the first 20 we were one or two passes away from scoring two or three tries.
“The second good thing was our grit – we are becoming a side that is hard to beat and that is what we want to be like. We have got characters in there that don’t know how to get beaten.
“At stages today we looked like we were going to fade out of the game but we kept hanging in there – people kept getting off their feet, making tackles. Lawes is like a human ice bag – he has got ice packs all over him – he made that many carries and tackles; Launchbury too.
“There are a lot of good characters in our team. We had a young team