Saracens make 12 changes to their XV for London Irish
Saracens make 12 changes to the starting XV for the trip to face London Irish at Twickenham Stoop in the Gallagher Premiership.
Richard Barrington, Manu Vunipola and Elliot Daly keep their places at loosehead, fly-half and outside centre respectively after helping a young Sarries side overcome Gloucester in midweek.
The team is otherwise not too dissimilar to the one that hosted Harlequins in the London Derby in Round 15.
Bar the introduction of Barrington, the pack is the same with hooker Jamie George and World Cup winner Vincent Koch making up the front row and Maro Itoje lining up in the second row alongside Callum Hunter-Hill.
Jackson Wray edges closer to 250 Saracens appearances on the flank while Billy Vunipola and Mike Rhodes also feature.
Another heading towards a significant milestone, Alex Goode returns at full-back after a two-game absence. His fellow back three companions Sean Maitland and Alex Lewington crossed for tries in their last outing.
Wales international Aled Davies and captain Brad Barritt complete the backline.
Saracens team to face London Irish on Monday:
15 Alex Goode (298)
14 Alex Lewington (49)
13 Elliot Daly (8)
12 Brad Barritt (258)
11 Sean Maitland (75)
10 Manu Vunipola (23)
9 Aled Davies (2)
1 Richard Barrington (190)
2 Jamie George (228)
3 Vincent Koch (83)
4 Maro Itoje (121)
5 Callum Hunter-Hill (17)
6 Mike Rhodes (95)
7 Jackson Wray (247)
8 Billy Vunipola (112)
Replacements
16 Tom Woolstencroft (37)
17 Sam Crean (8)
18 Josh Ibuanokpe (13)
19 Joel Kpoku (32)
20 Calum Clark (51)
21 Tom Whiteley (44)
22 Juan Pablo Socino (3)
23 Dom Morris (20)
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Skelton may be brought back for the Wallabies so that would be the only reason that may hinder Wilson. Easily the form, most skilful and game IQ of any Oz 8. Valentini’s best and favourite position is 6, but lineouts may be an issue with Skelton, Valentini and Wilson. Will be interesting what Schmidt goes for but for me Wilson should be picked on form. Schmidt rewards work rate, skill and consistency. All that glitters every so often won’t be in contention. Greely is one of those players that has a knack of making the right decision. A coach is going to love him because he knows week in week out he’s going to get the job done. The second try Greely wasn’t the guy who made the initial break it was Flook, Greely was at the bottom of the ruck when Flook was off along the sideline. Greely got up and made the effort to catch up with play but also read the play nicely and hit the pass from Campbell at pace and then held the pass beautifully to Ryan.
Go to commentsSharks deserved to be far further back by the last quarter. Their tackling was awful, their set pieces were disappointing, their defensive organization was poor (especially on the Kok side of the D line), they kept making unnecessary errors, and they never looked like cracking the Clermont defense during those first 60m. Masuku kept them in touch, with some help from the Clermont generosity on penalty opportunities. Agree with the writer of this article. It was belligerence, and ability to raise their pressure game just enough, that turned the last quarter into a Bok-style shutout. Clermont have a reputation of not playing the full 80m, and there was a bit of that for sure. But, quite often when the intensity of a team drops off in the last quarter credit is due to the opponent for tiring them out. At 60m, with the Kok try, you thought that just maybe the game was on. At 70m, with the Mapimpi contribution, one felt that Clermont were fading, while facing a team that would maintain the pressure game through the final whistle. Good win in the end, but the Sharks are still playing way below their potential. And with their resources, and a coach that has had enough time to figure things out, they are running out of excuses.
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