By Sarah Braide
December 12 2002

Sale may as well go for broke in their next game against Llanelli. What have we got to lose? We're as good as out of the Heineken Cup and Llanelli beat us on our home turf last weekend. With nothing much hanging on this game let's show them what Sale are made of. Jason is captaining the side for the first time ever. Though he has played recently at centre (and last weekend, somewhat controversially, he wasn't even in the starting XV), on Friday he will be back at 15. Vaughan Going steps forward to fly-half and Nick Walshe returns at scrum-half replacing the absent (injured?) Bryan Redpath. Walshe will take over kicking duties since Jos Baxendell has taken a knock and won't be playing.

Good news for the team is the long awaited return of Alex Sanderson. He will bring a bit of steel to the number 8 position, and hopefully he'll keep his nose clean as well. But will there be aggro after last week's fight and two red cards? I hope Alex stays cool. Chris Jones has moved to the second row to make room for Alex, and Dean Schofield is out with an injured ankle. Apollo Perelini and Richard Wilks start for the first time in ages - maybe Jim is using the game to experiment a little?

Llanelli have named a side with few changes from last week, Whilst this is going to be a hard fixture for Sale, I do hope they enjoy it and show what they can do. Kick off is 19:45 at Stradey Park.

Sale team: Jason Robinson (capt), Mark Cueto, Dan Harris, Graeme Bond, Steve Hanley, Vaughan Going, Nick Walshe, Jim Thorp, Johnny Roddam, Barry Stewart, Iain Fullarton, Chris Jones, Apollo Perelini, Richard Wilks, Alex Sanderson.

Replacements: Stuart Turner, Kevin Yates, Stuart Pinkerton, Pete Anglesea, Stuart Brown, Mel Deane, Richard Wigglesworth.

Llanelli team: Garan Evans, Wayne Proctor, Matthew J Watkins, Leigh Davies (Captain), Mark Jones; Stephen Jones, Dwayne Peel, Iestyn Thomas, Robin McBryde, Martyn Madden, Vernon Cooper, Chris Wyatt, Simon Easterby, Daffydd Jones, Scott Quinnell

Replacements: John Davies, Marcus Thomas, Luke Gross, David Hodges, Guy Easterby, Gareth Bowen, Barry Davies.

Team	P	W	D	L	F	A	Pts
Bourgoin	3	3	0	0	113	77	6
Llanelli	3	2	0	1	113	88	4
Glasgow	3	1	0	2	62	94	2
Sale Sharks	3	0	0	3	51	80	0