Sale Sharks 21 Exeter 16

By Whaley Shark
February 9 2013

      

It was one of the longest minutes of my life as, with less than two minutes to go, the TMO thought long and hard about whether Exeter had thrown a forward pass in the build-up to the ‘try’ that would tie the scores and give them the chance, with the conversion, to nick all four points. The crushing disappointment of losing, having fought back from 16-5 down a few minutes after half time would have been hard to swallow, and you could see it causing lasting psychological damage to our fight for survival. So it was with a huge amount of relief that we saw the referee rule ‘No Try’ and we saw out the last minute or two to secure our first four Premiership points of 2013.

Even to be in contention at the death was quite an achievement, given the way we’d started. Most of the first 15 minutes was spent in our half and Exeter blew one good try-scoring chance before finally ‘taking the three’ to get the scoreboard moving. Exeter messed up the restart, conceding a penalty on their 22. We put it into touch, they were penalised again, we went for touch again and executed a neat catch and drive to put Daniel Braid over. We missed the conversion though, and then quickly gave Exeter another penalty for 5-6 after 22 minutes.

A missed touch clearance then gave Exeter another try-scoring chance on the left, which the TMO, warming up for his big moment, also disallowed. That only delayed the evil moment though, as Exeter built good pressure from a lineout 35 metres out, and put their winger Votu over on the right for a try. With the conversion, and another penalty a few minutes after half time, which put Exeter 16-5 ahead, the game seemed to be running away from us.

We rallied though, and after absorbing some more Exeter pressure, we put a penalty into touch 35 metres out, Rob Miller broke into the Exeter 22 and we outflanked the Exeter defence to put Mark Cueto in on the left. Rob Miller converted, then slotted a long range penalty to get us right back into the game, 15-16 down with over 20 minutes left. Ten minutes of play, marked by errors from both sides followed, before some naughtiness saw Exeter’s Kai Horstmann in the bin, and a Sale penalty about 25 metres out on the right, which Danny Cipriani put over off the post, to give us the lead for the first time in the match.

That triggered a bout of the jitters, as we conceded possession through some midfield silliness, won the ball back, then overcooked a cross-kick to put the ball into touch. But Exeter weren’t much better, with a squiffy throw at a lineout which gave us a scrum, then conceding a penalty at the scrum which we put into touch. That set us up nicely for a well worked drop goal from Nick Macleod, on for Rob Miller, and we had a little bit of breathing space. It also galvanised Exeter, who thrust deep into our 22 and we only kept them out by conceding a penalty and losing Kearnan Myall to the bin. Exeter ran the penalty and crossed on the left. And that’s where we started, with the TMO and his big decision.

I’m delighted with the win. It’s still going to be a long slog, but we aren’t dead yet, and three wins on the trot suggests to me that we are beginning to get our act together. OK, I doubt Tigers are quaking in their boots just yet, but we seem to be going in the right direction. And my Man of the Match- I’ve struggled with this, because I think it was a good team effort- so I am going to go for the TMO.