Maro’s a marvel
Itoje leads the way in ‘Ted Lasso’ comeback
IF SARACENS do go on to win the Premiership this season, perhaps they will hang one of their medals off the fish tank at their clubhouse in St Albans. The team’s two goldfish were key figures in this victory — featuring heavily in their ‘goldfish memory’ narrative borrowed from Ted Lasso.
They watched clips from the uplifting drama about a struggling American soccer coach in the build-up and vowed to move on from events of the past few weeks. Forget the victory over Bath, forget about Billy Vunipola getting tasered on a social in Mallorca and focus on making the play-offs.
And so they did, beating Bristol to move into second. Just like Manchester City, Saracens have a knack of winning games towards the end of the season. Just like Pep Guardiola, Mark McCall finds a way to bring the best out of their players when it matters.
Saracens qualified for their 13th play-off in 15 years, battling back from 10-0 down, with two tries from Maro Itoje. They were temporarily reduced to 13-men in the second half — Itoje and Ben Earl the sinners — yet they drew on their big-game experience and turned the result into a rout. After Harlequins’ defeat, it is now just as case of whether their semi-final will be home or away.
‘If you can drop what’s happened and put all your energy into what’s next then that’s the goal,’ said McCall. ‘We handled that period down to 13 superbly well. You’ve got to make smart decisions. Our defensive performance was as good as I can remember.’
The first quarter belonged to Bristol. Benhard Janse van Rensburg buried Marco Riccioni with the opening carry and coach Pat Lam barked at his players when they kicked the ball away cheaply.
Bristol are at their best when hammering the structure out of the game with pass after pass. They earned a line-out in the sixth minute and, after a couple of carries, Joe Batley powered over for the first try. AJ MacGinty extended the lead to 10 points before a yellow card for Siva Naulago knocked them off track.
Saracens allowed Bristol to play to their strengths but they capitalised on the inevitable mistakes. Throw long passes and it risks an intercept or knock-on. Bristol made four errors — malfunctioning at key line-outs — and Saracens scored four tries.
‘We had plenty of chances that we blew,’ said Bristol chief Lam. ‘With Saracens, when you chase the game there’s enough quality to make it difficult. We made too many errors at crucial times.’
Elliot Daly kicked 16 points to back up Itoje’s brace, before Harry Thacker scored for Bristol from a driving line-out when Saracens were down to 13 men.
But Saracens cleared their heads, slowing the game down and avoiding the breakdown to keep men on their feet.
They wiped down the ball at every lineout and Daly milked every second of the shot clock as time ticked away.
Then Rotemi Segun scored from a lineout steal and Juan Martin Gonzalez scored from a turnover attack to secure a crucial bonus point.