Sale 38-17 Bristol - George Ford stars as Sharks end PREM season on a high

Rekeiti Ma’asi-White broke the line before feeding England centurion George Ford to score the game’s first try after just 73 seconds. Ford added the extras to make it the maximum and the perfect start for Alex Sanderson’s men.

It took the Sharks only two minutes to extend their lead as Tom O’Flaherty’s line break gave the hosts the platform to attack. Despite losing the ball, the hosts kept the pressure on as on his final game as a Shark Raffi Quirke pounced on a loose ball before Ben Bamber galloped down the touchline feeding the flying Tom Roebuck who gave the ball back inside to the second row to score the game’s second try.

Ford added two more points to his tally for the afternoon making it Sale 14-0 up.

A third Sharks try came from the alertness of Quirke who worked his way down the shortest of blindsides before delicately delivering a kick for Scotland winger Arron Reed to chase and dot down after 17 minutes. Ford’s right boot took him over double digits for the afternoon increasing the lead to 21-0.

The bonus point try was wrapped up inside 24 minutes by Joe Carpenter as Asher Opoku-Fordjour’s bulldozing run allowed for the Mancunian side to capitalise on the quick ball. The ball travelled coast-to-coast with a perfectly executed move across the back division before Tom O’Flaherty found the England full back who crashed over. Ford missed the kick leaving it at 26-0.

The Bears’ response was almost imminent as Harry Thacker broke the Sharks defence before being brought down. A few phases later, Noah Heward to crash over from close range. Sam Worsley added the extras to reduce the deficit to 26-7.

A second Bristol try came in the dying embers of the first half after a period of being camped on the Sharks line for a long time as Tomas Gwilliam guided a perfectly set up maul over from close range. Worsley missed the kick leaving the score at 26-12 at half time.

Sharks Director of Rugby Alex Sanderson says he is “happy with the response in defence” with the attack being in the model of the way the gameplan is going. Moreover, with a result like that and the recruitment the club has done, “there are things to get excited about on the back of that.”

Furthermore, the DoR again praised the youth system of the club with both Seb Kelly and Reuben Logan getting significant plaudits. The season hasn’t been the plainest sailing for Sale, in fact, in Sanderson’s eyes, it has been “the longest, hardest, most challenging season I have ever had.”

For the Bears Director of Rugby Pat Lam, he couldn’t have been prouder of the boys from BS3 today despite the result, especially of the younger lads like Ollie Harris going up against the likes of Tom Curry and George Ford. Additionally, the experience of the skipper for the day Harry Randall made Lam proud too. “He kept everyone calm,” alongside experienced Joe Batley allowed the Bears to have some doggedness in what a blow could’ve been out score after going 26-0 down inside 24 minutes.

The result today “sums up our season” as there was a lot of good things shown, but without the names present, the quality of opposition is there to see. The likes of AJ MacGinty, Ellis Genge, Louis Rees-Zammit and Tom Jordan being omitted today for various reasons whether it was due to the RFU laws around EQPs or injury the opportunity for others to step up was there and they did that today.

Ford 2’, Bamber 5’, Reed 17’, 62’, Carpenter 24’, Ma’asi-White 43’

Ford 3’, 6’, 18’,44’

Heward 26’, Gwilliam 40’, Worsley 75’

Worsley 27’

Carpenter 7 (Wills 27’ 6), O’Flaherty 7, Roebuck 8, Ma’asi-White 8 (James 67’ 6), Reed 8, Ford 8, Quirke 9 (Warr 59’); Opoku-Fordjour 8 (McEachran 59’ 7), Jibulu 7 (McEachran 67 7’), Harper 7 (Bell 59’ 6), Van Rhyn © 8, Bamber 8, Dugdale 6 (Andrews 59’ 7), Kelly 8, T Curry 7 (Logan 48’ 8)

Lane 5 (Harris 53’ 7), Heward 6 (Pepper 29’ 5), Bates 5, J Jenkins 4 (Wolstenholme 44’ 6), Boshoff 5, Worsley 5, Randall © 5; Woolmore 4 (Grahamslaw 68’ 5), Gwilliam 6 (Hill 80’), Lahiff 3 (Chawatama 53’ 5), Dun 5 (Halliwell 68’ 5), Taylor 6, Owen 6 (K Jenkins 63’ 7), Thacker 7, Batley 6 (K Jenkins 48’ (Batley 53’))