It was another exceptional encounter, a sunlit thriller in Reading, pulsating with action and drama from first to last. Saracens had to chase the game and they had to protect their lead and, in doing so, they added richly to these days of majesty for the club rugby of England.
There were heroes and villains. The Vunipolas shone, as did George Smith and Dan Robson. Owen Farrell was a little scratchy over the kicking tee and a little scratchy of temperament – not for the first time – in the tackle. He was sent to the sin bin in the second half but returned to steady his team’s progress. Wasps too had to cope with being reduced to 14. Simon McIntyre was given 10 minutes for kicking Maro Itoje, which sounds worse than it was and did nothing to sully the overall positive feel of the game.
Any fear that this semi might take a little time to reach the dramatic heights of the Wasps-Exeter quarter-final was crushed within a minute. Or to be precise, 18 seconds over the first minute of play, at which point Dan Robson touched down for the opening try. Wasps had claimed the kick-off and kept the ball in hand, going wide one way, then the other until Frank Halai released Christian Wade and the winger surged out of his own half, before passing to his scrum-half. There was still work to do, but Robson side-stepped inside his covering opposite number and made it to the line. Jimmy Gopperth converted from a tricky angle.
It was a statement of daring and adventure by Wasps and it also marked the moment when they said goodbye to the ball. From the scrummage where Petrus du Plessis won a penalty against Matt Mullan, Saracens dominated possession and territory. Having started scintillatingly on the front foot, Wasps were now exclusively on defensive duty.
So tight was Saracens’ grip on the ball that it seemed only a matter of time before they touched it down for a try of their own. They felt confident enough to kick penalties to the corner, rather than take three points.
Even when Farrell, deciding finally that a little something on the board should not be resisted, pulled his first shot at goal wide, it seemed that it was still only a matter of time. The Vunipola brothers were on the charge and the recycling rituals were crisp and efficient.
Even when a touchdown by Duncan Taylor, falling on a loose ball in the Wasps dead-ball zone after Halai had failed to make it safe, was disallowed it seemed it was still only a matter of time. It took a lot of it to review the charge by Chris Ashton into Halai. Eric Gauzins, the television match official, and Romain Poite eventually decided that the one wing did lean a little too obstructively into the other, but Saracens were soon back on the attack.
If there was a problem for them – other than having no points yet – it was their passing, which was a little untidy at times. The close-quarter stuff was brutally slick; beyond there, less so. The clock was running deeper towards half an hour and this business of having nothing to show must have been starting to nag.
When the try came, it was a bit of a gift. There was no slickness required – just good old pressure – as Michael Rhodes chased the ball from a scrum and jumped in front of Gopperth. The Wasps fly-half had wound himself up for one of his monster clearances and the act of bracing himself for contact lasted a fraction too long. Rhodes blocked the kick, kept his feet and picked the ball up off his toes to score. The South African was having a superb game.
Farrell missed the conversion but landed his first successful kick in three attempts on the stroke of half-time. It had taken time, but Saracens were at long last in the lead. And it grew not long afterwards, with two long, and more assuredly struck, penalties from the same boot.
It was not the last intervention by the England player. Soon he was in the sin bin, for a dangerous tackle on Robson. The incident cost Saracens three points, but no more. Wasps were now starting to play with abandon, but could not beat down the Saracens defence. Nothing new there, although the steal by James Haskell and the run by Wade from a quick lineout showed that Wasps would never stop trying.
Farrell returned as McIntyre was heading for the bin, the replacement prop having tapped, rather than kicked, Itoje while trying to break free from the second row’s grip. It was a grip that could not be broken by any means and when Farrell kicked the penalty, and the conversion following a penalty try awarded after an all-in driving maul was hauled down, it seemed that the game was done.
Not a bit of it. Back came Wasps, throwing long, long passes to work their way around the rushing defence. Elliot Daly, denied by that suffocating blanket all day, suddenly had a bit of space. Off he went, gliding, sliding and setting up the ruck close to the line, over which Ashley Johnson barrelled to set up a frenzied last few minutes.
It ended when Joe Simpson had the ball stripped and the referee deemed it a knock-on. Saracens, through to the final; Wasps out in heroic fashion, just like Exeter in that quarter. European rugby has never been played as vibrantly in England.
