Quins cap off a fine season

London – As the entire Harlequins squad, staff and their families cavorted around the pitch soaking up every last drop of joy from their amazing 40-38 Premiership final win over Exeter, it was easy to forget how dire things were at the club five months ago.

Two wins from their first seven league games had them worrying about relegation as the relationship between head coach Paul Gustard and the squad was splintering.

Gustard was dismissed but instead of replacing him the club empowered their existing assistant coaches and the senior players to formulate the resurrection.

Before the former England defence coach’s departure the team were scoring an average of 21 points per match and Saturday’s win was their 14th from 19 games at a scoring rate of 35 points per match.

Visionary flyhalf Marcus Smith has been given the freedom to run the game as he sees it, with veteran scrumhalf Danny Care giving him the ball and every encouragement.

They finished fourth in the table but the journey looked to be over in the semifinals when they trailed 28-0 to a blistering Bristol after half-an-hour of their away clash.

Somehow they came back to win that game in extra-time, and the self-belief that generated was oozing through their veins on Saturday.

“We started to believe in what we’re about and what we want to be. We don’t do it the easy way, The group of boys has got stronger and stronger” said Man-of-theMatch prop Joe Marler, a veteran of Quins’ last triumph in 2012.

Exeter, last year’s English and European champions and appearing in their sixth successive final, are the masters of seeing a game out and when they opened a five-point lead with 13 minutes to go the odds were heavily on them retaining the title.

Quins though continued to attack with verve, slinging highrisk passes that ended with 20-year-old Louis Lynagh (above) twice flying over the line in the corner and Smith, surely due for his full England call-up, slotting both conversions. –