After Saracens had defeated Harlequins resoundingly at Wembley in March, the director of rugby of their London rivals, Conor O’Shea, contrasted the recent trophy records of the two clubs. No English side had won more in the previous three years than Quins, he noted, while his opponents had not needed silver polish in that time.
“They will be pretty keen to end that,” he said. Even more so now after the European Cup final, between two clubs who had finished at the top of their respective leagues and were both chasing the double, was won decisively by Toulon. Having fallen in two semi-finals last season, to Toulon and Northampton, Saracens are looking at the prospect of a repeat one stage further along.
They play the Saints in Saturday’s Premiership final at Twickenham and while Northampton have a swagger after coming from behind to defeat Bath in Friday night’s Amlin Challenge Cup final at Cardiff Arms Park, Saracens face another season ending in anticlimax. The portents are not good: when Toulon beat them in the semi-final last season, Sarries lost at home to Northampton in the Premiership semi-final two weeks later and they were routed at Franklin’s Gardens last October a week after being pipped by Toulouse in the Heineken Cup at Wembley.
Saracens had beaten Clermont Auvergne by 40 points in the semi-final having controlled the breakdown, but after winning early turnovers against Toulon, the tackle area became dominated by Steffon Armitage and Juan Smith. The wolf pack scattered and Sarries became too individual.
“I hope it is something we learn from,” said the England No8 Billy Vunipola. “I do not think we left anything out there as a team, they just got the better of us. We did not play as we can, but there was no lack of heart or effort. When we receive a setback, we tend to react positively and that has to be the case this week. We know what we have to improve on: we lacked a bit of detail against Toulon, which is why they won so many turnovers.
“I perhaps tried to take it on myself too much and went away from the team patterns. It think it was just my lack of spatial awareness and it is an area I need to work on, staying within the team framework rather than trying to be Superman. We know what happened last year and we do not want a repeat of that: Northampton are a good team and we cannot just play on emotion. They will be at the top of their game and we need to come up with a plan and carry it out.”
Saracens were appearing in the European Cup final for the first time and some of their supporters missed the start of the game, the one period when they were on top, because of heavy traffic on the M4. All those who were travelling on official coaches will receive a full refund and they will not have as far to travel on Saturday.
“We will pick ourselves up for Northampton,” said the flanker Jacques Burger. “We had a sulk after the game, but we have another opportunity to win a cup and what we have to take from defeat is that a big game comes down to taking opportunities. You will only have a handful and while Toulon converted their chances into points, we did not. They deserved their win but we will learn a lot through defeat. We will also reflect, in time, on what an achievement it was to reach this stage and the more finals you play in, the more you know how to win them.”
Saracens have lost four of their past five matches to Northampton, two in the LV Cup, and their last two victories against the Saints have been by narrow margins, although they were in control at Allianz Park last month until conceding two late tries.
“We are desperate to finish the season with a trophy,” said the centre Brad Barritt. “If we achieve that, we will be able to reflect on a very successful campaign. A few words were said in the changing room afterwards and the message was that we want to finish with a bang. It will take a concerted effort, but we are as hungry as ever. We were not that far off against Toulon, it was just minor things in the game. A big strength of this team is the way we bounce back and we have to show that this week.”
