However, there is now only one point separating 8th from bottom place and with these teams still having between four and two games left to play, each team involved in the relegation battle has a chance of scraping together the points required to stay up.
Just as a last minute score by Elvis against London Irish a week last Thursday had lifted relegation favourites Bath from the bottom of the table, it was a last minute try by Gloucester's South African full back Thinius Delport and subsequent conversion from Ludovic Mercier which saw us only pick up a losing bonus point in what should have been the biggest upset of the season. Still, that was last week and we now have to build on that performance for our final three games of this campaign.
Following defeat against Gloucester in the Powergen Cup final and Toulouse in the Heineken Cup quarter-final, Northampton gave an emphatic performance in their Zurich Premiership game against Bristol Shoguns on Wednesday evening. The first half finished a relatively close 7 – 13 to Bristol. The second half was a different story and Northampton scored 36 unanswered points. The danger man appeared to be All Black Bruce Reihana who was playing at full back in place of the injured Nick Beal, while ex-Rotherham winger Oriol Ripol also appeared to be a bit of a handful.
Northampton are currently laden with injury problems, this being best demonstrated with Ben Cohen playing at blinside flanker for the last 10 minutes of the Bristol game. Full back Nick Beal and Paul Grayson both missed the game against Bristol, however they have both been reinstated for the trip up to Kingston Park. The Northampton team announced today is:
15 Nick Beal
14 Oriol Ripol
13 Peter Jorgensen
12 John Leslie
11 Ben Cohen
10 Paul Grayson
9 Matt Dawson
1 Tom Smith
2 Steve Thompson
3 Robbie Morris
4 Matt Lord
5 Mark Connors
6 Darren Fox
7 Budge Pountney (capt)
8 Andrew Blowers
with replacements from: Matt Miles, Matt Stewart, Chris Budgen, Rob Hunter, Mark Soden, Grant Seely, James Brooks, Bruce Reihana and Mark Tucker.
For the Falcons, the usual team announcement has not been made with Rob keeping everyone waiting until the final moment to select from the squad listed below.
Shaw, Botham, Walder, Stephenson, Noon, Mayerhofler, Wilkinson M, May, Wilkinson J, Godman, Grindal, Charlton, Peel, Isaacson, Makin, Thompson, Hurter, Ward, Andrews, Grimes, Hamilton, Taione, Mower, Vyvyan, Dowson, Dunbar, Newby, Britz.
The injuries to Mark Andrews and Epi Taione are being assessed day by day, while the availability of Dave Walder, Marius Hurter and Liam Botham are also being looked at. If Andrews and Taione are not available then this will allow Rob to include back row imports Britz and Newby. Whether both will start is doubtful and will depend on selection at lock, where Hamilton (pictured) could start in place of Andrews, or Vyvyan could move up from the back row. This would allow Dowson or Newby to start at number 8, with Britz on the blindside and the returning Andy Mower to reclaim his place at openside.
The backs should be as they were for the Leicester and Gloucester games with Tom May making a good impact on the wing, in both defense and attack. I would expect Grayson and Beal to pressurise our back three of May, Stephenson and Shaw with the high ball, with the Northampton back row following up very quickly. We should also expect the ball to go wide to Ripol and stretch our defence. This is where Gloucester managed to score against us last week and where we should have been working on that area during this week. We should also keep a close eye on Cohen who has a habit of coming through at pace from a variety of angles.
The main area to target has to be John Leslie who has a habit of holding up the ball in the tackle and with Mower likely to target Grayson it may be Britz who has to do a job on former Falcon Leslie.
Prediction: Falcons to win – because we have to!
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