All posts tagged: Sale Sharks

Unstoppable Noah Caluori inspires record Saracens win – but they cannot spell his name right

Unstoppable Noah Caluori inspires record Saracens win – but they cannot spell his name right

Scrum half Charlie Bracken was also exceptional while centre Olly Hartley and No 8 Tom Willis provided a continual stream of go-forward. Again, there was very little resistance from Sale and this will bear a long and painful review. Sale’s season may already be at an end and they have a horrific injury list but the absence of fight and heart was inexcusable, particularly at a point when the club were launching their season-ticket drive. At the very minimum, the CorpAcq should be a horrible place to visit for the opposing teams; the rugby equivalent of your cold Tuesday night at Stoke City. The inquest will begin in earnest on Monday morning as Sanderson gathers his squad to address what exactly their motivation is and where it has disappeared to. “I thought I was pretty clear at the start of the week around some of the things that were motivating the group,” Sanderson said. “Now I have asked them to come in tomorrow and tell me what’s motivating them individually. Some of those collective motivational …

Kepu Tuipulotu inspires comeback as Bath’s heavyweight bench sees off Sale

Kepu Tuipulotu inspires comeback as Bath’s heavyweight bench sees off Sale

Ewan Richards picked off a Sale attacking line-out and, from his own 22, Tuipulotu pummelled his way down the short side, running through two tackles, before spotting space in the Sale back field and setting up replacement scrum-half Van der Linde perfectly with his piece of footballing magic. Then came Barbeary’s killer thrust, after 28 punishing phases, to put them within sight of the finishing line. While Sale engineered a great position to steal the win late on, George Ford – playing his first game since February 21 after being dropped by England following the Six Nations defeat to Ireland – lost control of the ball and the chance slipped away. It was Sharks’ ninth defeat of a disappointing league campaign. “I’m crestfallen,” said Sale’s director of rugby Alex Sanderson, who was forced to play a hooker, Nathan Jibulu, at No 7 because of his back-row injury issues. “I’m just gutted for the amount of effort that the lads put in. It is frustrating but it’s seemingly a similar story to how the rest of …