Aviva Premiership Season Preview: Northampton Saints

Lee Calvert previews the biggest teams ahead of the Aviva Premiership season. This week: Saints.

The year is 2011 and at half time of the Heineken Cup final at Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium, Northampton Saints are 22- 6 up over Leinster. What happened in the second half is the stuff of finals legend, and has haunted Saints ever since.

What happened is that Leinster, led by Jonny Sexton, scored 27 unanswered points to take the trophy 33-22. This writer was at the game, and as the lights were dimmed for the presentation spotlight to shine on the Irish team my eyes were drawn to the men stood over to the right, out of the pool of light. Some Saints players were sitting, some standing, a few slowly pacing. All hung their heads hin devastation.  That was how Northampton finished that final, literally and figuratively: in the darkness.

Fast forward to the end of last season, and some of that feeling pervaded around Franklins Gardens as the Saints missed out on the playoffs for the first time since 2010, after a season littered with banana skins.  These included their international prop, Alex Corbisiero, being given leave midway through the season following his request for a break from the game, and losses to each of the teams that finished in the bottom three – including by a point to an Andy Goode inspired Newcastle in February.

On the other hand, they were also one of the very few teams to beat Saracens in their all-conquering season. So given that, what to expect this time around?

Head coach Jim Mallinder is not one to panic, and this has been demonstrated by his lack of knee-jerk transfers. He knows that his team is fundamentally of high quality and one strange dip does not undo five years of lessons learned and experience gained. Instead he has gone for small additions of quality that range from solid (Nic Groom, Campese Ma’afu) to world class (Louis Picamoles) – that is assuming the the rampaging 115kg Picamoles turns up and not the wobbly 125kg one that waddled around France last season.

Northampton Saints are at their core a team of considerable ability. With a consistent squad and coaching set up, great off-field structure and a solid academy, they are perhaps more likely than some of the bigger recruiters to make the playoffs this time out.

They missed out last year because of very narrow freak results against poor teams – had those gone the other way then Saints would have comfortably made the top four. Expect those games to go their way this season.

Last season: 5th

Prediction: Playoffs

Head Coach: Jim Mallinder

Ins: Louis Picamoles (from Toulouse), Campese Ma’afu (from Provence), Charlie Clare (from Bedford Blues), Nic Groom (from Stormers), Juan Pablo Estelles (from Club Atletico del Rosario).

Outs: Alex Corbisiero (sabbatical), Matt Williams (to Worcester Warriors), Danny Hobbs-Awoyemi (to London Irish), Patrick Howard (to Dragons), Kahn Fotuali’i (to Bath), Jon Fisher (to Bristol).