Fabulous Farrell leads way for Sarries
England stars return to inspire crushing victory over Sharks
SARACENS’ returning England stars helped the defending champions inflict one of the most comprehensive European Cup defeats of recent times.
Mark McCall’s men, buoyed by the return of Owen Farrell, Jamie George, George Kruis, Mako Vunipola and fit-again Maro Itoje, completely outclassed their fellow Aviva Premiership outfit to maintain their position at the top of Pool three and as favourites to defend their Champions Cup title.
Saracens were so dominant, McCall could afford to remove England playmaker Farrell only a minute after the break with the game already won at 26-3 and his job long since done.
Farrell, who is in line to take over from Dylan Hartley as England captain if his expected ban materialises, will have many more intense battles to fight in the coming months.
Hooker Jamie George, the man most likely to benefit from Hartley’s latest disciplinary meltdown, was among the try-scorers as Saracens annihilated their opponents in an embarrassingly one-sided affair.
As good as Saracens were, Sale were every bit as bad. The visitors had three men sent to the sin bin but contributed almost nothing else.
Steve Diamond’s men lacked direction, purpose, cohesion and quality as they folded in the north London rain. Their European hopes are over for another year.
Losing captain Josh Beaumont after 20 minutes to injury didn’t help, but they were already 13-3 down and staring down the barrel of a thumping defeat.
That defeat materialised and such was Saracens’ dominance, they were able to make a raft of second-half substitutions, among them giant Wallaby forward Will Skelton, who made his debut 50 minutes into the game after his signing was announced earlier this week.
What Sale, already battered and bruised, must have thought of the sight of the 22st brute pounding on to the field is anyone’s guess.
One thing was for sure, this scoreline was in no way flattering to the home side. With Hartley’s latest brain freeze threatening his participation in next year’s Six Nations, all eyes were on George in the build up to the game.
The 26-year-old hooker was hugely impressive for England during the autumn as a second-half replacement for Hartley in all four victories over the southern hemisphere visitors.
His is a powerful carrier, set-piece technician and sound defender, and there is a school of thought that believes England would not be weakened in any way should George be required to step into the breach in Hartley’s absence.
Indeed, such has been George’s sustained excellence for the defending Aviva Premiership and European champions, many believe it is high time he is promoted to England’s starting line-up, regardless of Hartley’s availability.
In desperately wet and slippery conditions, both sides took a lowrisk approach in the early exchanges. Handling was difficult, even on the artificial pitch, as each team tried to pin the other back with tactical kicking from the half-backs.
Farrell kicked two early penalties for the home side while opposite man AJ MacGinty kicked one for Sale but it was Richard Wigglesworth, playing against his former club, who was pulling the strings from scrum-half for Saracens.
Wigglesworth, who signed for Saracens from Sale in 2010, sniped constantly around the base of the scrum and kicked intelligently deep into opposition territory.
His link play around the ruck enabled his team to send runners piling in behind Sale’s defence and the home side’s first try came direct from a sharp break from Wigglesworth, whose clever flicked offload to Marcelo Bosch allowed the Argentina centre to dummy Paolo Odogwu and speed over. Farrell converted before adding his third penalty on 23 minutes, when Sale No8 Laurence Pearce was sent to the bin for a late hit on the fly-half.
That grip became vice-like when Sean Maitland latched on to a flowing Saracens backs move, embellished by the deftest pass from Farrell, to cut in off the opposite wing and scream over for a crisp try. Farrell converted and the game was as good as over inside 26 minutes. Bosch extended the lead to 23 points at half-time with a longrange penalty.
With Farrell removed from the action, Sale lost Jonathan Mills to the sin bin early before George bundled over from a driven line out.
Chris Wyles collected a brilliant kick from Alex Goode for the fourth try and Maitland touched down again before James Flynn became the third Sale player sin-binned. Richard Barrington then crossed to complete the humiliation.