Saints v Tigers Prem Cup - 21st Novemember 2025 - Teams Up

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2025:11:28:11:56:35 by Saint Ted.

Strong saints line up.

Quote:

tigersimon
Strong saints line up.

I'd say 3, 6, 8, 10 , 14, 15 are the only real positions where saints undeniably stronger than Tigers and 2,7,12 go the other way. for the starters,I would say a maximum of 4 make Saints first choice 15, and probably 7 of 23

A strong line-up, good to see Furbs set for more minutes if not the full 80. JJ and Kemeny will add a bit of something extra. Hope Belleau isn’t too serious, we need him, he’s a great bench option.

I have some concerns...

Furbank made 30minutes as part of returning from injury. We're now starting him without recognised cover at 10.

Are we looking at Pater to cover or Thame who 'covered' 10 for a few minutes last weekend.

Otherwise, seems a sensible side with some more experience than last week. Hopefully we get that backlash from last week.

Quote:

St Stokey.
I have some concerns...
Furbank made 30minutes as part of returning from injury. We're now starting him without recognised cover at 10.

Are we looking at Pater to cover or Thame who 'covered' 10 for a few minutes last weekend.

Otherwise, seems a sensible side with some more experience than last week. Hopefully we get that backlash from last week.

I mean the major problem is who else would you have at 10? Fin's with England, Hutch is with Scotland, Tony's Injured as is TJ so i don't think there's literally anyone else who's ever played there

Hendy at a push maybe. Perhaps we should have kept Paul Hill?

No mention of Tom Pearson. Anyone know anything? He's been fantastic whenever he's played.

Who’s the development player tigers have at 7 ?

[www.leicestertigers.com]

Imagine Pearson and Manny rested as they played England A games.

Pater can do 10, seems a big ask so early in his career to be 10 back up but I am guessing it's him, noting also MacParland was (I think) a schoolboy 10, same Hendy

Quote:

Smooothsides

Quote:

tigersimon
Strong saints line up.

I'd say 3, 6, 8, 10 , 14, 15 are the only real positions where saints undeniably stronger than Tigers and 2,7,12 go the other way. for the starters,I would say a maximum of 4 make Saints first choice 15, and probably 7 of 23

Probably about right on Individual positions.

Two first XV 🐯 and probably 8 would make a first choice Matchday 🐯 23.

Here’s to a good game and safe travels.

Davison also rested fully.

That injury list has started to grow again, just when it was starting to come down:
Emeka Atuanya, Anthony Belleau, Will Glister, Tom James, Curtis Langdon, Tom Lockett, Marco Manfredi, James Martin, James Ramm, and Charlie Ulcoq.

Would be really nice if Belleau, James, Lockett and Ramm were available for this next big run of games. Think Langdon is def out.

Am excited to see this team out tonight. In particular:
- Want to see what McParland has got about him
- Will be the first time I've properly watched Caqusau
- Feels like quite a big game for Munga; if he does well, he'll get the shirt alongside VDM against Bristol
- I just love watching Hendy; full stop

There’s a lot to like about watching Hendy

No rest requirement for Fin, going into next block but Mitch, M1 & Coles will need to miss a game.

Hutch & EMM no rest requirement.

Fischetti will need a week off.

Team change for Saints, Archie McParland out, Weimann starts and Pugh (debut) onto bench.

Could have an issue at SH in the next few weeks, with Tom James N/A due to injury and Mitch having to stand down for one of the next 3 games unless dispensation applied for and granted.

Bad start. 7-0 after a minute.
But JJ now has 2 tries! Hat trick?!
7-12

An interesting and watchable game so far.

Pretty even first half

Trust Premiership Rugby to mess this up with an awful comms team of Tigers fans/players and general coverage. And why do we need to see them + the team sheet so regularly? I'd rather watch the game in hieroglyphics (as long as there's not Tigers involvement).

Saints look absolutely awful !

Scrappy careless second half from Saints

70 minutes in and I’m not sure what is more dire….Saints performance or the commentary on YouTube. We look like a bunch of strangers……….

I hope we pick things up a bit when the Prem returns - the last two games have been fairly dire.

Oh well, never wanted to get anywhere in this competition anyway ... I'm sure we won't miss the potential extra gate receipts etc. etc.!

I’m not fussed about this comp but this has been a poor performance from a reasonably strong side. Constant errors and lack of sharpness. Tigers deserved winners.

Hopefully a good wake up call for next week.

First half okay, second poor. Tigers much better at the basics and in defence.
There should be quite a few players back next week - Fin, Trev, Pearson, Hutch, Manny, maybe Pollock at least - we really could do with avoiding the usual mare at Bris. Any info about Archie, who was meant to start but had to withdraw ... ?

Shocking poor second half after an entertaining first half

Hope Hendy is ok and not going to miss games

Quote:

NGSB
70 minutes in and I’m not sure what is more dire….Saints performance or the commentary on YouTube. We look like a bunch of strangers……….

Definitely the Saints performance.
It's absolutely woeful and worryingly, yet another collapse with the scoreboard not being troubled at all from about 35 minutes in !

Sleightholme looked very frustrated. I hope none of the injuries are serious.

Not the reason why we lost but when will premiership rugby give up on making poor touch judges referees? We get pinged for going up early in a lineout when Tigers went up before us. Cleopas gets told he's second man in a ruck - there was no one else there. This was just in the space of a few minutes.

Far too many knock ons - I don't care how rusty we are, it's not on.

Sorry but Ollie, if he's costing a lot, we need to think about moving on. We hardly see him and for 2 weeks he struggles with catching the ball. It may take time for him to get up to speed, but with his injury record, he is regularly on a comeback.

I thought Sir was wretched but I've felt that before under his watchful eye.

Quote:

Toulousian Firefighter
Not the reason why we lost but when will premiership rugby give up on making poor touch judges referees? We get pinged for going up early in a lineout when Tigers went up before us. Cleopas gets told he's second man in a ruck - there was no one else there. This was just in the space of a few minutes.
Far too many knock ons - I don't care how rusty we are, it's not on.

Sorry but Ollie, if he's costing a lot, we need to think about moving on. We hardly see him and for 2 weeks he struggles with catching the ball. It may take time for him to get up to speed, but with his injury record, he is regularly on a comeback.

And it's not the first time he hasn't passed for a clear try to someone else.

We don’t seem to function well after some down time
Wasn’t it the same team that stuffed us at home following a break

Disappointing tonight. Too many handling errors.

I agree the comms is awful but with TNT failing to cover even a single PRC match during the AI!!
It is TV coverage and it’s FREE, the co-commentator’s last week were also Home club players!

Prem rugby had obviously taken onboard some comments from last week as the teams weren’t shown nearly as much as Gloucester v Bath! So much so that often in the 2nd half you didn’t know who was on the pitch!

Sir is just a terrible referee out of his depth at this level and with out a TMO his incompetence is just highlighted even more!

Not sure what was said in the HT talk but your 2nd half performance!

Don’t worry a minimum of two more meetings this season!!

Saints are known as an expansive team that seems to play fast rugby. The last three games in the PC don't seem to reflect the ambition of the first choice fifteen. On paper we had the stronger team last night with Kemeny, Hendy, Litchfield, Graham, JJ, Furbank, Munga and Sleightholme all starting but it remained a woeful performance which seemed to suggest that the result was unimportant.

Fourth choice No9 and also caught short at 10 plus several others returning from long injury layoffs.

Tigers deserved the win and with in my opinion a less experienced side than us tonight . They were smarter, seemed like they wanted it more, and could actually catch the ball. Sleightholme after long break is very rusty. He was very poor against the red bulls and just as bad against tigers. He will struggle to get back in this team when everyone available . Furbank showed glimpses of what he can do and i expect him to ramp up and own the 15 shirt again . Im not worried about this result though and maybe we will finally play well at bristol where we normally dont . Expect trev, pearson, iyogun, mcparland back for sure next week with fin smith, dingwall, pollock, fishetti, todaro also maybe an option. Mitch and coles will likely miss bristol game, not sure on hutch he may be avaialble aswell. Also who knows freeman could be available .

Any news on why McParland dropped out? And Tom James injury?

Hutch is presumably just a Townsend selection rather than injury so should be available as no rest requirement.

A squad for Bristol
Iyogun
Smith
Trev
Coles (depending on fitness of Lockett & Munga)
JJ
Kemeny
Pearson
Chick

Mitch
Fin

Todaro
Hutch
Thame
Sleightholme
Furbank

Wright
West
Green
Prowse
Pollock
Graham
Weimann
Litchfield

Assuming Hendy, Freeman, M1, James, McParland, Tony N/A

If James is close to a return, we may choose to play Mitch early and mandatory rest him later.

Don't expect Tommy back before the New Year

Quote:

Toulousian Firefighter

Sorry but Ollie, if he's costing a lot, we need to think about moving on. We hardly see him and for 2 weeks he struggles with catching the ball. It may take time for him to get up to speed, but with his injury record, he is regularly on a comeback.

2 years ago Ollie was the leazzding try scorer in the league, 15 tries in 15 games, last year he had 5 in 9, which whilst not as good is still well above average. He had one injury at the back end of last year, and another in preseason. Years go he's had a few struggles but he's still for my money the best attacking player we've got, and the only real gas competing for a start so its a bit premature to be thinking about binning him off for me

I was told 2 years ago that Ollie was too muscular and would never make a full season as he was so injury prone. It is looking like that was right

Quote:

Steve Batt
I was told 2 years ago that Ollie was too muscular and would never make a full season as he was so injury prone. It is looking like that was right

If you have seen him since his return to play you will have seen that he has spent a lot of time on the gym and has added some serious upper body muscle on top of what he had before.

Let's wait and see over the next few games if he is injured again.

Quote:

Steve Batt
I was told 2 years ago that Ollie was too muscular and would never make a full season as he was so injury prone. It is looking like that was right

Told by who?