Saints .............. 52 Rotherham ........ 5
LEE Dickson led a Northampton charge which flattened Rotherham in this pre-season contest which followed Saints’ win over Cornish Pirates.
Dickson scored twice and made a third for flanker Lewis Ludlam in a 10-minute burst after half-time which demonstrated the gulf between Premier- ship and Championship teams.
A new-look Rotherham – fielding nine debutants – had more than matched Northampton in the opening half. The Yorkshire team even had the cheek to score first against a Saints XV including Louis Picamoles, who started at No 8.
When flanker Laurence Cowen forced his way over from short range it gave Rotherham a deserved lead.And it would have been more if Charlie Foley, signed from Moseley, had not missed two early penalties and the conversion of the try.
Northampton quickly erased the deficit through tries from Luther Burrell and Tom Stephenson, who was later carried off with a leg injury.
The decisive spell came immediately after the interval when Dickson scored twice and made a try for Ludlam after he had raced out of his own half.
To continue the one-man show Dickson converted the three tries to put Northampton 33-5 up, having led 12-5 at the interval.
Dickson was substituted for his heroics but Northampton continued to dominate scoring three more tries – including two from fly half JJ Hanrahan – to complete a win by eight tries to one.
The big defeat left Justin Burnell, Rotherham’s head coach, thoroughly “frustrated” at the number of individual errors.
He said:“I thought we should have been ahead at half-time but we turned round 12-5 down.The individual errors cost us.We played well for 50 minutes but you have to do that for 80.”
Assistant coach Alex King was full of praise for a clutch of new faces led by Picamoles.“I thought they all did well. It’s good to get back playing again after the pre-season.”