Mark McCall admits Saracens to rotate players to topple Leinster in Champions Cup
Saracens head coach Mark McCall is thankful an independent disciplinary committee have not ended the club’s efforts to defend their Heineken Champions Cup title this season.
Last Friday, the Gallagher Premiership side were fined 50,000 euros (£42,500) – half of which is suspended – for fielding an ineligible player in their January win over Racing 92, but crucially not deducted any points which would have resulted in them exiting the competition.
Prop Titi Lamositele played in the victory, which clinched a quarter-final spot, despite the American international’s work permit expiring on the day before the match.
Committee chairman Roger Morris explained in a statement last week “this was an unfortunate sequence of events brought about by an administrative oversight” and Sarries will hope to put this latest controversial chapter behind them.
McCall said: “Titi has been at the club since he was 18 and has played however many games for Saracens so there was a difference between this case and other ineligible player cases in Europe.
“And thankfully I think the committee agreed with that and thought the fine was what was appropriate.
“What was good about qualifying this year in Europe is we’ve used a lot more players than we have done in the past because we were targeting the Premiership until the relegation was confirmed.
“I think we’ve used 42 or 43 players in Europe and that quarter-final was hard-earned and earned by the whole squad, in particular in the last two matches when we went down to 14 men in both and managed to win both, which was a great achievement.
“It (the quarter-final) is something in seven or eight weeks time to look forward to.”
Saracens found out they would still face Leinster in April for a spot in the last four while playing Sale in the Premiership Rugby Cup semi-finals last Friday when the verdict of the independent disciplinary committee’s meeting in London was revealed.
Many wondered if the Champions Cup holders would be thrown out of the tournament, given back in the 2012-13 Challenge Cup Grenoble were deducted four points for fielding an ineligible player against London Welsh.
On that occasion Lotu Taukeiaho played for the French outfit even though he was not registered as a tournament squad member.
“Everyone knows Titi has been part of the club for a long time and played in five pool matches as well,” McCall added.
“In other cases the player wasn’t even in the European Cup squad. Titi was in our European Cup squad. It is just one of those things.”
With Saracens still in the Champions Cup, the focus at Allianz Park has turned to defending their crown with relegation from the Premiership confirmed at the end of the season for repeated salary cap breaches.
Head coach McCall admitted “a little bit” of planning has started over how best to use the squad during the six league games between now and the April 4 clash at last season’s beaten finalists Leinster.
“We have a week off in between after these first four Premiership matches so with some players, they won’t play all six of those games,” he said.
“They will play a good percentage of them, but not all six. We will try to rotate the squad and drill this period down to keep everybody busy.”
After losing at Sale last weekend in the Premiership Rugby Cup, Sarries will welcome Steve Diamond’s team to Allianz Park in the league on Saturday.
McCall revealed the younger members who impressed in the defeat could feature in the second meeting in quick succession between the sides.
He added: “We’ve got 10 playing international rugby and a few people injured as well, so we’ll have a different team.
“But some of the lads that played on Friday night will get the chance to play again and against a team who are really on top of their game at the moment and one of the form teams in the Premiership.”
Comments on RugbyPass
Why cant I watch Rugby games please?
1 Go to commentsBeautiful shot from Finau, end of story. Gutted for Shaun Stevenson though.
4 Go to commentsThe Chiefs definitely didn’t win ugly. They had the superior scrum, a dominant lineout, and their defence was excellent once the Waratahs scored their two tries (thanks to some lucky refereeing calls mind you). They put pressure on the Waratahs lineout throughout the game, and the mind boggles as to why the referee did not award a yellow card or a penalty try against the Waratahs for repeated scrum infringements on their own try line before Narawa’s first try. And the Chiefs were slick with their passing and running angles on attack. It was a dominant performance all round, even with many questionable refereeing decisions.
1 Go to commentsWasnt late. Ref 2 assistants andTMO all saw it so who are you to say it was?
4 Go to commentsAre the Brumbies playing the Blues twice in a row?
4 Go to commentsBig difference from the Saders. Forwards really muscled up and laid a solid platform. Scooter brought some steel and I liked the loosie combination. Newell has been rather disappointing this season but stepped up big time - happy also to see Franks dot down. He should do that more often! Reihana had a good game and there seems to be more flair and invention with him in the saddle. McNicoll plays well from the back and is reliable plus inventive when he joins the line. Keep it up chaps!
3 Go to comments🤦♂️🤣 who cares who’s the best . All I know is the All Blacks have the star coach but have few star players now …
30 Go to commentsJe suis sûr que Farrell est impatient de jouer avec Lopez et Machenaud et d’être entraîné par Collazo… 🤭
1 Go to commentsAn on field red (aka a full red) in SRP must surely carry a bigger suspension than a red card given by the bunker as that carries a 20 minute team punishment. Had Damon Murphy abdicated his responsibility as a ref and issued both Drua players a yellow, which would have been upgraded to a 20 minute red by the bunker, that would have killed Australia and New Zealand’s push for the 20 minute red to be trialled globally from July this year.
11 Go to commentsEver so often you all post a Danny Care story that isn’t the announcement that he has finally re-signed for one more, victory tour season at Quins and I’m just like, “well you fooled me again!” My absolute favorite player ever, we need to make his final year at the Stoop (and Twickers) official already. I know he supposedly snubbed France but I won’t feel better until he signs.
1 Go to commentslate hit what late hit it wasn’t at all late and can clearly see he was committed before the tackle
4 Go to commentsChristian Lio -Willies 2 try perfomance was a standout. As was captain Scott Barrett. Up front was where the boys won it.They are a great team and players. Fantastic Crusaders , you can keep going.
3 Go to commentsI don't know how the locals feel about that? I guess if you call yourselves the Worcester Wasps that might be appease. But really we need more teams in the Premiership in my view so they are not padding it out as they are at the moment. It might curtail so many players going abroad as well
5 Go to commentsNZ 😭😭😭is certainly rivaling England for best whingers cup!😭😭😭 !!!
30 Go to commentsYup. New Zealand won 3 out of 10 world cups played. SA 4 out of 8 attempts 30 Vs 50 per cent.🤔🤔
30 Go to commentsShould've done this years ago. Change Saturday kick off times to around 11am. Up and off and back home before 3pm, limit travel time too. Allows players to actually do something else with their Saturday that's family oriented or being rugby fans they could ‘watch’ pro rugby. Increases crowds etc. How can anyone that enjoys grassroots and pro rugby have to choose between the two on Saturdays?
9 Go to commentsI bet he inspired those supporters just as much.
1 Go to commentsBen Smith Springboks living rent free in his head 😊😂
67 Go to commentsGood to hear he would like to play the game at the highest level, I hadn’t been to sure how much of a motivator that was before now. Sadly he’s probably chosen the rugby club to go to. Try not to worry about all the input about how you should play rugby Joey and just try to emulate what you do on the league field and have fun. You’ll limit your game too much (well not really because he’s a standard athlete like SBW and he’ll still have enough) if you’re trying to make sure you can recycle the ball back etc. On the other hard, you can totally just try and recycle by looking to offload any and everywhere if you’re going to ground 😋
1 Go to commentsThis just proves that theres always a stat and a metric to use to justify your abilities and your success. Ben did it last week by creating an imaginary competition and now you did the same to counter his argument and espouse a new yardstick for success. Why not just use the current one and lets say the Boks have won 4 world cups making them the most successful world cup team. Outside of the world cup the All Blacks are the most successful team winning countless rugby championships and dominating the rankings with high win percentages. Over the last 4 years statistically the Irish are the best having the highest win rate and also having positive records against every tier 1 side. The most successful Northern team in the game has been England with a world cup title and the most six nations titles in history. The AB’s are the most dominant team in history with the highest win rate and 3 world cups. Lets not try to reinvent the wheel. Just be honest about the actual stats and what each team has been good at doing and that will be enough to define their level of success.
30 Go to comments