The Saints are marching on rather than in. They saw precious little of the ball but still scored three tries to go into the new year ahead of the rest with their eighth victory in nine Premiership matches. Harlequins attracted a capacity crowd for Big Game 7 and played with their vigour of old but their fourth defeat in six leaves them a long way adrift of the play-off places.
The statistics showed Harlequins had 74% of the possession but it was Northampton who showed the control, especially during the seminal period of the match when the champions’ prop Salesi Ma’afu was in the sin-bin after felling the centre George Lowe with a high tackle 33 minutes in.
Statistics say that a team concedes an average of seven points during the 10 minutes it has a player in the cooler, but just as the match stats told a different tale to the scoreboard so the Saints have a way of figuring out how to overcome the handicap of a one-man disadvantage.
Having beaten Leicester the previous week despite a red card shown to Dylan Hartley after 17 minutes they now scored 10 points without reply while Ma’afu was reflecting on his tackling technique.
After Stephen Myler had kicked his second penalty of the evening to take Northampton into the interval 13-8 ahead his opposite number Tim Swiel was wide from 35 metres one minute after the restart when Samu Manoa had been blown for holding on. Swiel’s next contribution was to have his clearance kick charged down by Manoa who had spent Boxing Day in bed with a virus.
Manoa wrestled Matt Hopper for the bouncing ball and freed George North who ran 20 metres to score and effectively settle the match. Although Harlequins, who scored their opening try after five minutes having played more than four hours in the Premiership without finding a way over the opposition line, kept the possession statistic going and twice reduced the deficit to a bonus point-salvaging five points, they lacked the cohesion and composure under pressure of the leaders.
The Harlequins’ director of rugby, Conor O’Shea, said he thought the performance marked the turning of a corner, an opinion that will be tested not so much in the next round when they face hapless London Welsh but the following week when Leicester, another side used to finishing in the top four but now with an uncharacteristically loose grip on the play-off positions, visit the Stoop.
Despite enjoying most of the ball and territory, Quins were in a winning position only when it did not matter, 10 minutes in. Lowe’s first league try for two years, from a move he started on his 10-metre line when he beat Myler on the outside and then appeared on the right wing after a breathtaking spell of offloading and recycling, was followed by Swiel’s first penalty.
Northampton looked as if they had overindulged over the festive period, slow to rouse themselves. Even their set pieces were creaky: they lost their first scrum to a heel against the head and, without the banned Hartley and the rested Courtney Lawes, their lineout was picked off by a team that contested rather than prepared to defend a driving maul.
The scrum settled down when Alex Corbisiero came on in the second half for his first appearance since suffering a shoulder injury in September and the lineout eventually generated two tries, but this was a match that Northampton won despite being some way below their par, never mind their best. Quins, who without Joe Marler and Chris Robshaw lacked their opponents’ resources, needed to be at something more than their best. They were menacing when Danny Care took penalties quickly and play broke up but lacked Northampton’s clout and craft at the breakdown.
The possession statistic that so favoured Harlequins was undermined by the 17 penalties they conceded. While they felt some of the marginal refereeing decisions went against them, they were also fortunate not to concede a player to the sin-bin in the final quarter as Northampton kicked a series of penalties for touch rather than go for the three points and give their opponents the opportunity of a restart.
Northampton’s opportunism, and the self-belief being top of the table breeds, deflated Harlequins’ early buoyancy. After Mike Brown’s breakout from his own half had been ended by him conceding a penalty for holding on, which O’Shea contested, Saints kicked for touch and did so again after being awarded another penalty. Manoa was chauffeured to the line after his second throw for his ninth try of the season. The score summed up the visitors: absorb pressure and take advantage of sporadic raids.
Quins looked finished at 20-8 down, but after Swiel and Myler had exchanged penalties and Corbisiero had twice crossed the line only to be denied a try – turned over on his back the first time and a few minutes later dropping the ball as he tried to touch it down – the flanker Jack Clifford showed the feet of an outside back when he cut inside North to get the crowd back on its feet. But there was to be no comeback.
Saints’ replacement scrum-half Kahn Fotuali’i looked to have secured the victory eight minutes from time when he turned another penalty lineout into a try, injuring his left shoulder in the act of touching down. Harlequins had enough Christmas spirit to muster a final attack that ended with Sam Twomey scoring their third try. The bonus point was a reward for endeavour and boldness but they will need something more to get back into the top four.
Harlequins: Brown; Yarde, Hopper, Lowe, Monye (R Chisholm 67); Swiel, Care; Lambert, Ward (Gray 67), Collier, Matthews (Sinckler 67), Robson (Twomey 63), Trayfoot, Clifford (J Chisholm 77), Easter (capt).
Tries: Lowe, Clifford, Twomey. Cons: Swiel 2. Pens: Swiel 2.
Northampton: Foden; K Pisi, G Pisi (Stephenson 48), Burrell, North; Myler, Dickson (Fotuali’i 54; Wilson 72); A Waller (Corbisiero 54), Haywood, Ma’afu (Denman 60), Dickinson, Day, Clark (Dowson 60), Wood (capt), Manoa.
Tries: Manoa, North, Fotuali’i. Cons: Myler 3. Pens: Myler 3.
Referee: Wayne Barnes
Attendance: 82,000
Match rating: 7.
