Beaten Saracens explain how pre-game injury has retired Sean Maitland

Mark McCall has sifted through the ashes of a terrible Saturday for Saracens where not only did a limp 10-20 defeat to Sale cost them a home semi-final in the Gallagher Premiership, a pre-match injury suffered by the retiring Sean Maitland ended his career a couple of weeks early.

The London club announced on Friday the 35-year-old former Scotland winger would hang up his boots at the end of the 2023/24 season.

However, he won’t get to say an on-pitch farewell in the league play-offs following an agonising pre-match round 18 injury sustained in a collision at StoneX Stadium with teammate Elliot Daly.

Maitland was due to start in place of Rotimi Segun, who picked up a hamstring issue during the week, but damage to his knee shortly before the kick-off ruled him out versus Sale.

It has since emerged that the damage is so bad that Maitland is now retired and won’t be available for the semi-final at Northampton on May 31.

“He has hurt his knee,” confirmed a downbeat McCall. “I think it is a PCL which is so cruel for someone like Sean who has given this club so much.

"Rotimi Segun was meant to play and he pulled his hamstring in training and Sean was somebody we could rely on. We all know how good he is in these big games and to end his career in that manner…

“What I saying to Sean in the changing room there is he doesn’t need to play one more game or two more games for Saracens. His legacy with the club is incredible. He is an unbelievable person, an unbelievable teammate to everyone who has been here, so he didn’t need to play another game.”

Alex Lewington, who started at short notice for Maitland, gifted Sale the converted Rob du Preez try that put the Manchester club 3-20 ahead, a margin that Saracens could only close to 10 points by full-time.

The bonus-less loss enabled Sale to jump into third while Saracens fell from second to fourth, sending them on the road in the play-offs rather than hosting a knockout match. “We were poor today, outplayed, out-enthuse if we are honest,” admitted McCall.

“That’s a difficult thing to say with what was at stake. You had that little thing at the back of your mind because everything was on the line for them [Sale] and we had the safety net of already being there (semi-final qualified) and was that going to play a role.

“It shouldn’t have but it certainly looked like their want, you saw how enthusiastic they were. If that is the case that is disappointing.

“I thought some of our bench added a real energy but we made a lot of mistakes in that period as we tried to force things and probably got a little bit desperate, but at least we gave it a go. It’s not what we wanted.

“But I suppose our number one strength this year as a group has been responding to setbacks and disappointing performances like that very well and our next performance being really strong because of the honesty in the group.

"We are going to need to do that, there are no more second chances. We need to respond strongly to what happened today.”

Looking ahead to the Franklin’s Gardens trip, he added: “It’s going to be a tough game. They have played fantastically this year.

"But we have got a group here that is very capable and can produce big, big, big performances and we have got two weeks to try to manage to do that.”