By Sarah Braide
January 5 2003

Friday night saw an enjoyable and convincing win for Sale over Newcastle Falcons, though Rob Andrew's comments after the match made it sound like he had been watching a different game. With five tries Sale netted a bonus point and it didn't matter that Charlie had not had a great kicking day. Just a quick reminder of the Albania connection for anybody who wasn't aware of it: last season Rob Andrew, discussing a forthcoming Sale v Newcastle clash, said that Sale beating his side would be like Albania beating England (the two sides were also due to meet around that time). At the time we took delight in winning the match and making Mr. Andrew eat his words. The announcer at the game repeatedly replaced "Albania" for "Sale" in his score updates over the loudspeakers and since then, nobody has let Newcastle forget the unfortunate remark. And sure enough at this game there were Albanian flags carried in the crowd (I assume that was Pitprop waving his flag as we exited the back of the ground after the match).

This was Charlie Hodgson's first game back after three months out injured. Andy Titterell also made a welcome return to the front row. Things started slowly with only a few penalties scored until the very end of the first half. Both sides made scoring chances but they all went begging because of silly mistakes being made. It is true that Newcastle had a lot of possession but they were lacking ideas with what to do with it - I think if their attacking had been stronger then Sale probably would have buckled. But in the event the score was only 6-3 to Sale by the end of 40 minutes. Luckily things changed with an injury time scramble.

First Dan Harris went over for a well worked, hard fought try. Charlie converted it. The score seemed to fire Sale up and right from the restart they looked a very dangerous side, dtermined to exploit the advantage gained from thre sin-binning of Andy Mower. After just a few moments Mark Cueto, who had been playing really well all half, went over in the right corner. Charlie didn't manage that kick but scored a penalty a bit later. The 21-3 half time scoreline looked very nice indeed, thank you very much.

Sale scored again early in the second half as Charlie Hodgson made a break that led to a second try for Cueto. But for the next fifteen minutes or so Newcastle took a firm hold on the ball and would not let go. Sale seemed unable to break out of their own half but Newcastle could not find any tricks to outwit the defence with. So it was a great relief when a bit of Jason Robinson magic broke the stalemate. Somehow he managed to run most of the length of the right touchline, avoiding all defenders and finally scoring in the corner.

Steve Hanley had put in some good work during the match and deserved the bit of luck that came his way in the dying moments of the game. Newcastle were looking to score a consolation try when a pass out to their right wing went awry and Hanley jumped for the ball, dodged a couple of dazed Newcastle players and jogged all the way to the far tryline. Jos Baxendell kicked the conversion and the ref eventually blew to end the Falcons' pain at 38-3.

Rob Andrew had some slightly one-eyed comments after the game:

"Out there we saw one side dominate while the other took their chances by scoring five tries.

"The scoreline was not a fair reflection of the way the match went. The match was 6-3 for a long time and we had a lot of possession and a lot of territory."

To be fair to him, he's right that they had lots of possession and territory and he's right to be positive about his side. But I'm sure he would rather have been in Jim Mallinder's shoes and to really have something to smile about:

"It's a good way to start the new year and it's great to get back to winning ways. I was delighted with our performance tonight - a display like that builds confidence.

"The finishing was good and so was our defence. Newcastle won lots of possession but they were fairly predictable with it and we weren't unduly threatened all night," he said.

Sale team: Jason Robinson; Mark Cueto (Vaughan Going, 66), Dan Harris, Graeme Bond, Steve Hanley, Charlie Hodgson (Jos Baxendell, 75), Bryan Redpath (capt) (Nick Walshe, 75), Kevin Yates, Andy Titterrell (Charl Marais, 66), Barry Stewart (Stuart Turner, 66), Chris Jones, Dean Schofield (Iain Fullarton, 60), Alex Sanderson, Pete Anglesea (Phil Davies, 66), Stuart Pinkerton.

Newcastle team: Liam Botham, Jamie Noon, Tom May (Joe Shaw, 60), Mark Mayerhofler, Mike Stephenson, Mark Williamson, Hall Charlton, Mike Ward, James Christian (Nick Makin, 4), Marius Hurter, Hugh Vyvyan (capt), Stuart Grimes, Jon Dunbar (Epi Tiaone, 69), Craig Newby, Andy Mower.