The message all week from Saracens, and repeated on virtually every page of the matchday programme, was that they were not getting ahead of themselves after the opening-round victory in Toulon, a feat that seemed to earn the club more attention than when they won the tournament last season.
The order was to stay grounded and so there was no liftoff against Wales’s sole representative in the Champions Cup, although they still secured a winning bonus point as the Roundheads indulged in the cavalier.
There was a time when the Scarlets were a force in Europe and Saracens were buried in the anonymity of the Challenge Cup, but it is nine years since the Welsh side made the knockout stage. Their opponents had won their previous 10 games and not lost a group match on their own ground for four years.
The Scarlets filled the role of underdogs admirably, but at no point did they look like winning. Saracens, even when indulging in attacking plays they rarely cover in the Premiership, were always in control. Their main concern was an arm injury to their England second-row, Maro Itoje, early in the second half that required an x-ray.
Saracens lost their captain, Brad Barritt, whose neck stiffened up in the warmup, but that did not explain a start as stuttering as it had been scintillating in Toulon. The Scarlets, who had won their previous four matches, took the lead with a seventh-minute penalty after Gareth Davies had got away with a knock-on as he contested a high kick.
Saracens’ fumbles were more conspicuous, and dropping became so catching even Itoje joined in. The double champions do not do complacency, but there was not the focus they had in France. Nick Tompkins wasted a break by overthrowing an inside pass, Alex Goode lost control of the ball when he was running with it, Sean Maitland was stripped of possession by Jonathan Davies as he struggled to find space on halfway, and Owen Farrell wasted a turnover by kicking the ball straight to Rhys Patchell.
They had by then taken the lead after Mako Vunipola sidestepped two defenders and broke the tackles of three others and, after Patchell and Farrell exchanged penalties, extended it with an even better individual try. Tompkins, Barritt’s replacement, had a wall of defenders in front of him when he received the ball 40 metres out from a ruck but, after swerving away from one, he dodged the next two before jinking past a fourth.
The Scarlets, already missing their injured Wales centre, Scott Williams, who turned an ankle on the morning of the game, lost the full-back Liam Williams after 13 minutes, also with an ankle injury. They were muted in attack, but slowed down Saracens’ possession on the floor and competed strongly, initially, in the set pieces – although, by the end of the first half, a disintegrating scrum resulted in Farrell’s second penalty.
There were too many mistakes for the game to flow. Saracens were surprisingly loose and, although they regularly forced their way over the gainline, too many passes failed to stick. The Scarlets were hanging on at times, but after Jonathan Davies had spearheaded their first meaningful attack two minutes before the break, Patchell’s fourth penalty made it 20-12 to the holders.
The Welsh region changed approach at the start of the second half, keeping the ball in hand and forcing stress fractures in the home defence.
Itoje, at the end of a week in which his club and England second-row partner, George Kruis, had an ankle operation, left the field grimacing after trapping his left arm in a tackle.
The Scarlets had hope, but within six minutes it had turned to despair. First, Vunipola set up a try for Marcelo Bosch and then Tompkins seized on a loose pass for Farrell to free Chris Wyles on the overlap and secure the bonus point. They were nowhere near their best, but still far too good.
The Scarlets caught out their opponents with some lineout moves and Aaron Shingler scored their first try from one with 21 minutes to go. Farrell responded with a penalty, but when Jonathan Davies’s strength took him through two tackles, the regions sighted a bonus point. Saracens were a man down, with Ben Spencer in the sin-bin for a deliberate knock-on, but Farrell spotted space and Michael Rhodes completed the scoring.
