Watch: Curry twins' amusing shared player of the match award

Ex-England international Austin Healey was at his mischievous best on Friday night when naming both Curry twins, Tom and Ben, as his man of the match after Sale’s semi-final clinching league win at Bristol. The Sharks were 36-20 winners at Ashton Gate to secure guaranteed passage to the last four of the Gallagher Premiership.

Both twins were back row starters for Alex Sanderson’s side. Ben – who made 36 metres from six carries – scored a first-half try and put in 14 tackles during his hour-long involvement while Tom registered a gigantic tackle count of 24.

With both forwards catching Healey’s eye, the BT Sport pundit decided to name both Currys as the man of the match and it left Rich James from tournament sponsors Gallagher in a post-game live TV pickle as he only had one medal.

In the end, presenter Sarra Elgan Easterby suggested that James hang the medal around the neck of the coat-wearing Ben. Here is how her presentation interview unfolded:

SEE: I’m going to ask Rich James from Gallagher to present the boys, I don’t know how he is going to manage it. Give it to Ben, you’re the eldest. Congratulations, gents. This is a first for us by the way, two players of the match. I can’t work out if Austin shared it because he couldn’t tell you apart or because he didn’t want a family squabble. But congratulations. Nice to be playing with each other again?

Tom Curry and Ben Curry share the #GallagherPrem Player of the Match award – a first for everything ? pic.twitter.com/NjAgarPoQd

— Rugby on BT Sport (@btsportrugby) April 14, 2023

BC: Really nice. Probably results haven’t gone our way recently so definitely for us group it was good for us to get a win so we can kick on.

SEE: You both made some impact on that game, fair play, and you booked yourself a semi-final spot for only the fourth time in the club’s history so that is huge.

TC: Yeah, but it means nothing unless we kick on. It’s another semi-final so again we have got to keep attacking it and get the home semi and whatever happens, happens.

SEE: Let’s talk a little about that game because the weather wasn’t great in that first half but when needed you scored one and you almost scored another one. Do you feel you could, should have bagged yourself a little bit more?

BC: It would have been nice to get five points, but fair play to Gus (Warr) and George (Ford), they controlled the game really well. A lot of those were due to them controlling the game, putting the forwards in the right positions so a lot of credit goes to them.

SEE: You had lost the last three of four league games coming into this, hitting a slump at the wrong time, and it was a tight match at half-time so what was the chat at the break?

TC: We had a pretty rubbish training week, to be honest with ourselves in terms of the team run was a bit down, a few dropped balls. But fair play to the lads, it shows where the group is at. It comes to game day and we are on it and at the end of the day, that is what matters. There are a lot of things that go deeper than just throwing a ball about together. The off-field stuff Alex is doing to build that resilience, this team four years ago wouldn’t have done that today so credit to the lads.

SEE: How big a part does the psychological side play at this stage of the season?

BC: It’s massive. Bristol would have easily come back into that. There were only six, seven points in it at half-time. We could have easily thrown that away. That last 20 of the first half, a lot of credit goes to the lads.

SEE: It’s now all about getting a home semi?

TC: It’s about winning the next game. It sounds really cliché but that is how you do it.