Premiership leaders plotting European conquest after perfect start

With two wins from two already in the Investec Champions Cup this season, Northampton Saints head into their home tie against Bayonne on Friday as arguably the form team in Europe at the moment.

Top of the Gallagher Premiership, unbeaten in their past seven matches and scoring a shedload of tries, Phil Dowson’s side seem insatiable at the moment, and their comeback win against second-place Exeter Chiefs at Sandy Park on Saturday solidified their credentials as a force to be reckoned with at the moment.

The team is crammed full of some of the form players in England currently, with recently crowned Premiership player of the month Courtney Lawes at the top of the list of in-form stars.

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Now the Saints want to bring their free-flowing game onto the European stage, according to winger Ollie Sleightholme.

The 23-year-old is the Premiership’s leading try-scorer this season, helped by his hat-trick against the Chiefs, where he was on the end of some of the most fluid passages of play any team has produced this season. Speaking to the EPCR recently, he said that they want to carry their good form into fixtures against Bayonne at Franklin’s Gardens and against United Rugby Championship winners Munster at Thomond Park, as they seek a second European crown.

“We’re top of the pile now here [in the Premiership] and we want to transfer that over to Europe. We want to put our game on the European stage,” he said.

“We’ve had a few games recently where we’ve come up against a team on a winning streak.

“We went away to Glasgow and they hadn’t lost for something like 18 games at home, and we turned them over.

“It’s just a case of knowing that when we put our game on the pitch, we do our things really well.”

Of course, Sleightholme emphasised that their good position at the moment means nothing if they do not perform when it comes to knockout rugby. However, two good results over the next two weeks would give them a favourable tie in Europe when the knockout stages do arrive.

He said: “[Being top of the league] is always a good place to be, but it means nothing if you’re not there at the end of the season or if you don’t perform in knockout rugby when it comes to it.

“Week in, week out, we just need to look at the next week as a new game. Do what we need to do to get that next win and keep moving forward.”