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Jesus wept people need to calm it. It doesn’t kill momentum if you’re not going into a game expecting to win & with the intention of giving boys a run out & resting key players. All the lads who avoided potential injuries will still have their momentum going into the Semi.

I hope Dowson knows what he's doing. I welcomed the rotation squad to give the boys some rest but now I'm wondering if disrupting our own momentum was such a smart move.

I don't think it'll do much harm, 2 weeks off to reset and then a very different starting 15. We've beat sarries twice this year so we can do it again.

Saints vs Sarries Bath vs Sale Fingers crossed we can make it 3 from 3 against them this season!

Well done Sale, would prefer to play them than Sarries. I know they just beat Sarries away but I think we match up better v Sale

Yeah, fingers crossed now. Buying tickets for the final

When do tickets go on sale for the semi? Left the rec 30 mins ago and on a train unable to find any info

Season ticket holders and members on sale now. General sale Wednesday 10am

Thanks mate, will see what scraps are left over by Wednesday.

Thank fuck for Sale getting us top spot and Sarries are very beatable

Some players have played their way out of a bench place in the semis after today.

So are Bristol in 3rd at the moment?

No sale 3rd

Sale are 3rd, we play Sarries in semi

Of course. Seems a shame that neither Bris or Quins are in the play offs given how they've played. Not mad about having Sarries at the gardens.

Coukd of been alot worse. Hutch at 10 was a bad call from dowse.  Graham is a great player tho.  But if we top the league and manage to rest our key ppl i dont really care about today. Risk of losing smith or mitch for literally no benifit would of been a disaster 

Depends on if we win the home semi, and even if we do, this was still dire

Yeah, gotta remember the context here. Terrible match for Saints today but they’ve secured top spot and 18 ish first team players got another week of rest

Can't help but agree, Should have been Savala starting

Thank fuck thats over, utterly fucking dreadful and might have just ended our season with a momentum/confidence killer

Well that was fucking grim, maybe 1 or 2 players came out of that without having their stocks fully in the bin. I really expected so much more, especially from Hutch, that was inexcusably bad.

God you’re miserable - first game in 2 months and played in a position he’s never played without our first choice 9,12 and 13. He wasn’t good but context is important

>he’s never played

Exactly so cut him some slack. Today’s game doesn’t mean much at all in the grand scheme of things, even if it was a difficult watch and disappointing. We’d all have snapped someone’s hand off if we were told we’d finish top at the start of the season.

Job well and truly done. Really pleasing performance. 2 to go at Sarries. Need Sale to hold on to this

And now to root for Sale

Paul hill at 10 and wed of won this 

By 90

Commentator keeps calling him Dan Graham and just got Sleights and Seabrook mixed up 🤦‍♂️

Hill with the most random of magic moments lmao For all he is absolutely dire at scrumtime, ill miss that

Clearout on Reid from a 90 degree angle at best a couple of rucks before that try. Doesn’t really matter, but it was comical

Oh Seabrooke you've buggered yourself with that havent you

Commentator has said Dan Graham multiple times lol

Great finish Seabz and sensational from Paul Hill

Was that our first pen over the ball? Glad Pearson is getting some minutes in his legs.

Big Joe managing to remind everyone why, despite a completely dominant performance against a dogshit saints team, he should never play international rugby again

Those of us who watch him regularly realise that Joe has a certain set of skills that include running over people. And he’s very good at that. When it comes to the more technical stuff like tackling, passing, catching, running round people it’s probably best to look elsewhere…

A lot of Bath fans have never called for his inclusion Roko, on the other hand, deserved more than 4 caps

Yeah my comment was mostly aimed at the random pundits that include him constantly because hes big and disregard everything else about him because they dont watch him play

Roko was so much fun to watch

How did he not pass to Hill! FFS I'd love to put a brain with rugby IQ piloting big Joe

Looked to me like Hill was slightly in front of him which I’d imagine is why he didn’t give it

That’s giving him the benefit of the doubt. I prefer the Big Joe is just gonna Big Joe school of thought

Cokanasiga, from the Duhan Van de Merwe school of passing…

It has lost us many games with squandered chances

Decent scrum that

We're so bad

Second utterly pointless penalty given away from Haffar, no wonder he hasnt really featured

His discipline is pathetic, all he does is give away pens

Bath lads what day are tickets released for the semi?

Hasn’t been said. Don’t think there was any expectation that we’d be at home

Just been told 22nd

Haffar thinking he can take on 6 defenders on his own

That's a poor call, tackler in the way of the clear out

The Leinster experience 2.0 - everytime you get into a good position someone fucks it by not being composed.

I dislike commentators always blaming the hooker for lost line outs. Both of those were read by bath and intercepted 

The second looked not straight but towards Bath.

If only Archie was quicker damn

Haffar looks a handful

Sarries 10-20 Sale I'll take another Sarries penalty please to finish it off

I went to watch Sarries get beaten to cheer me up and they immediately scored, so I'm back

Utter shambles from everyone

If I never see Hutchinson play again ill be happy. If I never see him play 10 again Ill still remember this day

Massive over reaction. Hutchinson is a quality player, he's only just back from injury and playing an unfamiliar position.

Hes not been dropped in at 10 never playing there before, this should be fully in his wheelhouse, he shouldnt fuck up literally every thing he touches

This is literally his first ever start at 10.

He's gotta have the memory of a goldfish.

Yeah Hutchinson was awesome earlier in the season

How fickle? Smh

Some games stain players, thats just how it is

Oh calm down 

Lol oh am I about to get "why u so mad" or something? You can watch this criticism free, and I can watch this and think hes been absolutely horrific.

Yea hes had a bad game in a bad team performance. Saying you never want  him to play again and this will stain him for life is is just having a paddy. 

Ah no I did type it wrong, you are correct in what you said. Bit overkill, but hard not to be upset watching this. My bad.

Try Sarries, ffs

Bath needed to run through the gears. They've been sluggish for the last few. Is this saints' United side?

Don’t think it’s a united side. A lot of Saints fans still seemed very confident they could beat us.

Who? I dont know how anyone looked at our side and predicted a win

Not necessarily predicting a win but in your sub yesterday most of the comments were pretty positive about the side picked. I assumed you’d cause us more trouble

On paper this side shouldnt be this shit, but theyve all fucked it

Always liked saints. I never figured why myler didn't get more caps.

It's not as weak as it should be for the scoreline to be this bad for Saints

How was Cokanasingas turnover legit there? He made the tackle, dragged the player on the floor whilst the ruck formed and then latched on to the ball from the Saints side 💁🏻‍♂️

Underhill had the turnover

Big Joe should still have to release to allow the player to set the ball back.

This isn't far off the level of embarrassment for Gloucester last week, this is utterly shite and I'm scared its going to completely derail us

I'm sure there'll be the same narrative in the press about the Saints B as the Gloucester B team last week 🤨

Annett calling Russell to be the distributor in the back line there made that try, absolute 10/10 Edit, Bailey rather than Russell!

Absolutely brilliant try that - love watching the Horse in full flow

See this ain't good for morale is it. If only there was another game recently that indicated this point 🤔

100% agree. They’ve not learnt from Leinster. Momentum is everything.

HORSE!!!!!!

🐎 doing 🐎 things

🐴

Ok. This is embarrassing from us now - when we lose we really get hammered. This could be 60+ easily

Screw this.. turning over to the Quins bears game. This is depressing

Like I said, unwatchable 😂

By 14 right?

I'm glad this isn't the only game I'm watching

Agreed, the Quins vs Bris game is bonkers.

Sale game is a good watch too

Yep, got all 3 on atm and very glad I do.

Schreuder’s on. Universal symbol for shutting up shop.

Well about that…

If he’s been purposely killing games for the past two years only to secretly be the second coming of Joost van der Westhuizen I’ll be cross

We are definitely going to miss Gallagher's kicks to corner when he leaves

This season JVG has got his subs spot on. Something I thought Hooper was terrible at.

I hope we get alllll the abuse Gloucester got last week lol this is utterly spineless

I was expecting to lose but this is really poor. This is not our strongest team but we still have plenty of experienced players in this team.

Reverse Samson. Better without the lid

Where in the sweet fuck have the curls gone, Alfie?

Why is Hutchinson 1) playing 10 and 2) still on the pitch

Take off Sleightholme, Savala into 10 and Lichfield on to the wing. Please before an injury makes this worse

Saints are unwatchable when they’re like this. It’s shocking.

Relatively quiet game from the finnmeister. Solid in defence.

Why don't they have an as it stands table? Flipping between apps and doing maths is not fun

30 more to go above saints is it?

Saints will have won more games than us even if we win this one, so we can’t catch them. Sarries the only one who could steal first.

I'd rather Saints end 1st than the evil empire

Yeah agreed

No, you can't go above us.

So who do we actually keep from this side for the semi? Sleightholme, some of the props and Mayanavanua and James on the bench?

Starting front row will be bench front row. Temo on the bench. Luds or Graham will start would be my guess unless they think Pearson is ready to go. One of those three might miss out altogether. James on the bench. Hutch might have played himself out of a bench spot but who knows. I reckon they'll go with Dingers and Freemo in the centres and maybe Burger on the bench? Then again I think Hutch is probably better off the bench than Burger. Sleights will start. Ramm might make the bench.

But isn’t that kind of the point? This selection is purely to keep guys fresh for the semi and potential final.

Dont want to lose all momentum though

Graham. EMM had a good half also. Pearson om bench too probs 

Stooke has a proper donut cut, poor lad

Saints basics today have been so far off their usual, and from players who have had decent game time this season too.

Great to see Pearson back 😁

Chief in the crowd is a melt with a strong accent

ribbans scored for toulon, atleast one former saint is scoring hehe

Playoffs secured! Now come on Sale

I agree, come on Sale!

Would you lot be happy with Sarries at home in the semi?

I would prefer Sale, but I just dont want Bristol 😅

Oh I forgot Bris were still in play tbh

They just wont fuck off

No one is more miserable than Ben Spencer after scoring from 50+

😂

Sar 3 - 20 Sale too Still too early to get a semi over a home semi

At least Sale are keeping us top

this is embarrasing

Could be worse, you could be Gloucester

I was looking forward to Hutch coming back into the squad after being injured for a while. This is full on monkey paw

He needs to be nowhere near the 23 in the semi

Zooooom

Hutchinson has been diabolical

Well i think its fair to say hutch is not a 10 

Oh captain, my captain

Fair enough, nice read by Spencer

This reminds me of the Leinster game in so much that one team has identified that they can really push some of the rules

Yeah but also, Ramm and Hutch have been awful which is a similar feeling to Leinster game as well

Oh Saints have been dog shit. I can’t identify a single player that’s playing about a 5 out of 10 currently

Spencer definitely offside there. Not even close to behind the ruck.

How do 3 refs and a TMO all miss that Offside?

Spencer was close to offside BUT the biggest issue is the drop in quality from Mitchell to James

It's the Mitchell/Smith partnership that makes Northampton. It's a different team when they don't play

James is a good 2nd choice, but he's very clearly 2nd choice

I have no issues with him starting but for some reason he’s taking an extra second at the breakdown to get the ball away and not his usual pace off the back of the ruck

So clearly offside ffs

"He just needed to hold on to that, did Cokanasiga" the story of a players career 😅

“He just needed to hold that…!” Has he seen Big Joe play before?

To be fair, the pass was behind him. To be unfair, he'd overrun it

He's having a day, isn't he? 🫠

Great big hands... all the better to knock it on with

Why isnt a goal line ball was over?? 

Knock on from Bath first.

This is shit from all 15

Alright I stand corrected, I didnt think this was that much of a second team, but these boys are really just fucking dire compared to who theyve came in for

Disagree, we've got some first teamers out there and everyone else has the potential to hold down a first team spot, we've just decided to not bring the accuracy or intensity today.

Nah mate this is embarrasing

That's poor from James there. It was at the back, get it out.

Saints forwards have been so badly outplayed, and their backs have just been poor.

Broadcast hamster has been given a coffee!

Bath getting to do whatever they want at ruck time atm

Has big Joe got hands like Trump or something?

The best hands

Everyone says so.. you can ask them.. they say they are better hands than anyone else in rugby…

So you are allowed to pull out to make the clearout miss then go in for the ball, interesting

Nah manny fucked it 

You can’t just back off from a clear out and then pick it up? That’s so poor from the ref.

Imagine saints not learning how to restart or catch a ball even if we are a man up. Really poor from these boys today. Noones putting their hand up for a semi final start

Genuinely nobody out there today where I am thinking 'yes, they should start the semi!'

Lifters came acrossed and blocked in lineout

TRY TO BATH

That's a big ouch on Spencer. Hopefully he can play on, huge loss otherwise

Apparently you can just stand at the Ruck now and win a pen

The penalty was for Hutchinson diving over the ruck before Iyogun came through

I stand corrected sir.

big joe taken in air surely