It’s going to be a walkover, a try fest, right?

Saracens v Leeds Carnegie
By Jonjo
October 23 2009

Well, on form of course it ought to be a clear and decisive win, but memories of Saracens falling to opponents who otherwise could not buy a win come flooding back. Teams that were in deep trouble, like Worcester, Irish and Harlequins, could come to Vicarage road secure in the knowledge that the improbable was still highly possible.

What do you call it when a team in form loses to one that isn’t? Is it choking, complacency or something else? Is it the team’s fault, the leadership on the pitch, the tactical preparation or the mental preparedness?

So far this season, Leeds have drawn 9-9 at home with Falcons, lost 27-7 away to Wuss (Friday evening game), lost at home 7-56 to London Irish, away 30-10 to Sinners and 10-26 at home to Gloss. Their aggregate score in the league is therefore 43-148, compared to 99-70 for Saracens, so you could say we have scored twice as many and let in half as many. In Europe they lost away to Bougoin 19-29 but won at home against Parma, 37-13.

If you are the nervous type, or your glass is half empty, you could say that Leeds come to this match with their confidence high after a good win and we have had our confidence dented by a loss. admittedly Toulon were a decent team but it also seemed to me that they had the tactics to defeat our up-and-in defence, running 3 men hard up the centre channels but passing the ball deep behind them and then outside our defence. Leeds are coached by Neil Back and he is no fool, so you can assume that he has taken note of the way we have played thus far, the tactics that have been tried against us without success and those that have worked.

Time therefore to see whether we can adapt those tactics, at least to create some uncertainty as to what we are going to do.

Again, the thorny question of squad rotation arises. If we play all our best players all the time, go through all the knockout stages in all 3 competitions I think we will have played something over 40 matches, so you undoubtedly need to rotate your squad, but if as a result of that rotation you don’t get to the final of the various competitions, you wouldn’t necessarily have needed to rotate in the first place. Nice little paradox, only truly solved if the key players are interchangeable with their alternates, or if the coach can pick enough “soft” games to rest his key men.

Some of the Leeds squad are familiar names, like Jason Strange, Marcus Wentzel, Seru Rabeni, Henry Paul and Andy Gomarsall. They lost a lot of players when they were relegated, played extremely well in Div 1 to bounce straight back up, and have recruited well this summer. The key question is: have they got a strong team or just a list of strong players? Can they build on their momentum at the moment ours falters? Can they transfer the nerves to us?

Bottom line: I expect a big Saracens win on Sunday. We slipped up against Toulon but the Dr will be on the case, our tactics will evolve and we will execute them a lot better than we did in France. But rugby is not such a simple game as all that, and the wheels can come off for all sorts of reasons. If we are in control after 20 minutes I think we will get that big win, but if it is all still to play for at half time, we will need to be at our best to get a win at all. I can’t believe that this Saracens team will crumble, but I will be a lot happier when some of those ghosts from the past are firmly nailed.

Saracens:

15 Alex Goode 14 Noah Cato 13 Kameli Ratuvou 12 Brad Barritt 11 Chris Wyles
10 Glen Jackson 9 Justin Marshall
1 Rhys Gill 2 Schalk Brits 3 Carlos Nieto 4 Steve Borthwick © 5 Mouritz Botha
6 Wikus van Heerden 7 Andy Saull 8 Ernst Joubert

16 Ethienne Reynecke 17 Matias Aguero 18 Richard Skuse 19 Hugh Vyvyan
20 Justin Melck 21 Neil de Kock 22 Derick Hougaard 23 Michael Tagicakibau

Leeds:

15. Leigh Hinton 14. Richard Welding 13. Seru Rabeni 12. Scott Barrow
11. Lee Blackett 10. Ceiron Thomas 9. Andy Gomarsall
1. Tommy McGee 2. Phil Nisen 3. Juan Gomez 4. Phil Murphy 5. Marco Wentzel (C) 6. Kearnan Myall 7. Hendre Fourie 8. Alfie To'oala

16. Vili Ma'asi 17. Gareth Hardy 18. Phil Swainston 19. Erik Lund
20. Calum Clark 21. Scott Mathie 22. Henry Paul 23. Henry Fa'afili