Lions pain will fuel Sarries title charge
ALEX Lewington does not expect Saracens’ recovering Lions stars to suffer any long term South African hangovers.
On the contrary, the wing believes the prospect of running back out onto the Premiership stage will quickly help heal any possible mental wounds.
Owen Farrell, Elliot Daly, Mako Vunipola, Jamie George and Maro Itoje have been granted plenty of time to recuperate from their exploits in South Africa.
While the remainder of the squad intensify their training regime ready for the big kick off, Saracens will be anxious to have the quintet raring to go
some time next month.
Mark McCall’s men face Bristol Bears on September 17 to kick off the new campaign.
Lewington says: “We are still waiting for our Lions to come back as they are getting a wellearned rest.
“They will make the most of that and knowing the lads as well as I do, will use what happened in South Africa in a positive way and only fuel their determination to do well for Sarries on our return to the top flight.
“They went through a similar disappointment in the World Cup and they came back and added to our environment. So I don’t think it is something we need to be worried about.
“Having not had Premiership rugby last season it is now a massive motivator for everyone at the club as well as those Lions boys coming back to help put the club back where we’ve been over the last decade.”
Lewington sees no reason why the club cannot revive their old title challenging ways straight back among Engagain land’s elite clubs.
He says: “Winning the title will be harder than ever with the talent more spread out now.
“But with the squad we have I’d back us to be up there challenging.
“The lads coming back are quality players. Ben (Earl) and Max (Malins) did so well for Bears while Alex (Lozowski) won the Challenge Cup with Montpellier and Nick (Isiekwe) was nominated player of the year for Saints.
“We have so much strength coming back while the club was able to give valuable playing time to so many others last season.”
Lewington adds: “We certainly have a nice one to start – it doesn’t get much bigger in the Premiership than a Friday night sell-out in Bristol.”