Champions Exeter pull off a great escape against Saints
MISFIRING champions Exeter took 70 minutes to get their act together and pull off the great escape after appearing to be plunging towards their fourth successive Premiership defeat.
The error-strewn performance left Chiefs boss Rob Baxter admitting: “I genuinely think we’re a little bit scared of losing the Premiership championship, which sounds odd because it’s not ours. You only get it when you win it at the end of the season.
“And I’m wondering whether a few guys are just a bit afraid of what they might give up rather than having the absolute drive to go out and win it which we had at this stage last season. That’s a mental factor we’ve just got to kick ourselves through.”
The Chiefs failed to take advantage of a huge pull in the penalty and lineout counts as Northampton, 13 points ahead with ten minutes to go, looked set for a thoroughly deserved victory.
But an electric burst by winger Olly Woodburn enabled replacement Phil Dollman to find Don Armand and the flanker left last man Nafi Tuitavake for dead with a sidestep worthy of a threequarter to cut the deficit to six points.
That finally fired up the Chiefs. They upped the pressure, forced three penalties in the right-hand corner and saw Northampton No.8 Teimana Harrison yellow-carded before switching their attack back infield for Thomas Waldrom to surge over leaving young replacement fly-half Joe Simmonds an easy winning conversion in overtime.
The Saints had shredded the Exeter defence after only six minutes when a patient build-up ended with the influential Rob Horne working a touchline one-two with flanker Jamie Gibson to stroll in.
Exeter responded with a catch-and-drive penalty try which put them level and cost Saints prop Campese Ma’afu a trip to the bin.
Then Luke Cowan-Dickie was held up after crashing over the line but Exeter butchered their resulting five-metre scrum.
Stephen Myler, on while Piers Francis had a head injury checked, restored Northampton’s lead with a 45-metre penalty and only desperate Exeter defending bundled scrum-half Nic Groom into touch two metres short after Harrison burst from the base of a scrum.
Exeter’s forwards got their act together again and the pressure resulted in Alec Hepburn – released by England to accomodate Joe Marler’s return – forcing his way over.
But Northampton led for the third time after Luther Burrell stormed over the halfway line and found Horne, who timed his release perfectly to send ex-England full-back Ben Foden racing in. Francis converted from the touchline to give Saints a 17-14 interval lead.
Exeter fell further behind three minutes into the second half when Francis and Horne split the Exeter defence to send Harry Mallinder clear for their third try.
Steenson pulled back a penalty for the Chiefs but Francis landed two more to extend the gap to 13 points before victory was cruelly snatched away as Exeter’s big players came through to secure what had seemed an unlikely bonus-point win.