Premiership clubs are enjoying their most successful season in Europe since 2007, when Wasps beat Leicester in the Heineken Cup final at Twickenham. It was the last, and only other, year when the league supplied three semi-finalists and with a guaranteed finalist this season there are prophecies of English domination for the rest of the decade and beyond.
Dai Young is not so sure. The Wasps director of rugby points out that after Northampton reached the final in 2011, over the next four seasons Saracens were the only English club to reach the last four of what is now the European Champions Cup, prompting dire predictions that Premiership sides would never be able to compete with the financial might of the French and the concentration of talent of the Irish. Wasps face Saracens in Saturday’s semi-final in Reading, with Leicester taking on Racing 92 the following day in Nottingham.
“I am not going to sit here and say this is going to be a regular occurrence,” says Young, when asked whether three English clubs in the semi-finals marked a shift in the European balance of power. “I was almost as dismissive a few years ago when not one English club got that far [in 2011-12]. Saracens have been the team fighting for England in recent years but I never thought the Premiership was as bad as it was then portrayed and we are probably now not as good as it looks either.
“We are closing the gap with the French and there is clear evidence the Premiership is a strong league. Getting five clubs through to the quarter-finals on a regular basis is probably not going to happen but we will get two or three. What happened a few seasons ago when only one made it was a blip and what is occurring now is good for the English game because if clubs are going well it has a knock-on effect for the national team. Players get used to winning.”
Wasps are preparing for their first European Cup semi-final since their 2007 success. Since then they have competed in the Challenge Cup as often as the top tournament but the move to the Ricoh Arena at the end of 2014 has transformed the club on and off the field, allowing Young to recruit leading players. Next season, Danny Cipriani, who started the 2007 victory over Leicester at full-back, will return from Sale.
“My goal as a coach is to have two quality players in every position,” Young says. “You can’t have three because you wouldn’t keep everybody happy. Danny is coming as an outside-half: he wants to be seen as a 10 and challenge there for England but if he had to look at other options I am sure he would.
“Some of the money we have been talked about with players we have been linked with is crazy and does me no favours with the squad. When you see in the press that we have offered £800,000 to someone, what do my internationals say to me? Of course, we are interested in quality players but do we have anything to announce? No, unfortunately.”
Young’s desire to have two outstanding players in each position has been realised at scrum-half where Joe Simpson and Dan Robson have been jockeying for position this season since the latter’s arrival from Gloucester. When Simpson suffered a knee injury at the end of January, Robson started the next nine matches, eight of which were victories.
“My game has developed massively during my time with Wasps,” Robson says. “It was tough at the start with Simmo playing so well but it meant I had to raise my game to get the starting spot. We push each other and we work really hard as a squad. It took a bit of time for things to gel as a backline but in recent weeks we have shown it is starting to come.
“We have improved over the season and our form in Europe has been pretty good. If you are going to win this competition you have to be able to beat benchmark sides like Saracens who have been consistently good in the Champions Cup for the last four seasons. They have a very strong, deep squad and they have been in a few semi-finals. It is our first in a while and it will be a challenge but we are confident.”
The clubs have played each other twice this season, with the score 1-1. Saracens won at the Ricoh at Christmas, throttling Wasps into submission, but the return at Allianz Park in February was even more one-sided as the visitors scored eight tries in a 64-23 victory.
“That win will have no bearing on Saturday,” says Robson, a candidate for the Saxons tour to South Africa in the summer and also a bolter for the senior trip to Australia. “It was a massively changed Sarries side and when it comes to knockout rugby, they have been there and done it. We are, though, in a good place and with so much to concentrate on with Wasps I have not thought about England.”
