he Boxing Day Guinness Premiership game between Worcester and Northampton at Sixfields Stadium.
A workmanlike display from Northampton, comfortable enough in the end, but one for which they had to strive very hard for an hour.
The victory confirms them as a real force in the Premiership as the year turns and there is little doubt, given the efficiency with which they go about their business, that they will be pressing hard come May.
They were denied an attacking bonus point when Shane Geraghty’s chip was snaffled in the final play of the game, but to score three tries away from home was highly impressive.
For 50 minutes there was nothing between the sides, which was sort of odd given that they occupy entirely different sections of the Premiership table. The other oddity was that Northampton are the top try scorers in the league with 24, after three more from Chris Ashton, Ben Foden and Phil Dowson, while Worcester have the worst record. They remain tied with Leeds at a miserly nine, having failed to add to that tally here against Northampton.
None of this would have been apparent to the neutral observer had they gone on the evidence of the first hour. The match was lively from the start. Northampton had two decent attacks inside the first couple of minutes and Worcester were just as intent on running the ball.
Yet, in the end, it was Northampton who cruised through. If the match demonstrated the close nature of the Premiership generally, it also underlined the importance of taking points when they are on offer and how crucial discipline is to a team’s fortunes.
Worcester gave away three early penalties to go 9-0 behind, had two players sin-binned and were unable to take their chances when they appeared. On the other hand, Northampton ensured their indiscretions remained outside the range of Worcester’s goal kickers and were far more clinical when it mattered.
One reason behind Northampton’s victory was their ability to slow the ball down at the breakdown. Soane Tonga’uiha was exceptional, banging into bodies just as the ball was due to come out, disrupting Worcester’s momentum and fluidity. Northampton were also well served by locks Ignacio Fernandez Lobbe and Juandre Kruger, whose physicality around the collisions was ferocious. Courtney Lawes, too, was an ever present pain in the backside for Worcester, even if he did fire one pass so high, wide and not so handsome that it went over Stephen Myler’s head and the dead ball line. Lawes will not like to be reminded of that when he studies the match tapes this week.
Yet Worcester must accept some of the blame for their inability to cross the white line. They have some fine attacking talent in Rico Gear, Sam Tuitupou and the inestimable Chris Latham, yet they cannot find a way to make the final pass or break tell. Several times Worcester attacked with pace and precision only for the move to break down at the end. Gear twice went close in the first period and Tuitupou hurtled through the midfield often, yet Northampton’s defence, led superbly by Dowson, were always able to snuff out the threat.
Sometimes these barren spells can be a kind of self-fulfilling prophesy, but unless Worcester find a way to prosecute their advantage when it appears, they will continue to wallow at the bottom of the league and that would not be a fair reflection on the quality they have or the endeavour they show. That’s not Northampton’s problem. Their only worry is how to maintain their momentum and accuracy for another five months. Three tries to none was not a fair reflection of their superiority, but since when has sport been fair?
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