Sale seal play-off berth after beating Bristol

David Skippers

Sale Sharks secured their Premiership play-off place and kept their hopes of a home semi-final alive after impressively overcoming league leaders Bristol Bears 22-12 at the AJ Bell Stadium.

In front of Sale’s first home crowd since March 2020, nothing separated the sides in the opening half as the match remained scoreless at the break.

The game was not without entertainment, however, with both teams producing a number of bone-crunching tackles before the contest sparked to life in the initial stages of the second period.

Bristol scored a brilliant try via Ben Earl to give them the lead, but that only served to inspire the hosts.

The Sharks dominated the rest of the match, crossing the whitewash via the Du Preez brothers, Dan and Rob, and hooker Curtis Langdon to secure an excellent win, despite Ioan Lloyd’s late response for Pat Lam’s men.

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It was an intense, physical and abrasive contest with Sale doing much of the tackling in the early stages. They weren’t helped by their own ill-discipline – a constant issue this season – which allowed the Bears to win successive penalties and put pressure inside the opposition 22.

That was briefly stemmed by a Bevan Rodd breakdown penalty but it was the visitors who were very much on the front foot.

Excellent work from Andy Uren sent Nathan Hughes scampering down the left and, although Sale covered well, the hosts were forced to concede a five-metre scrum.

That led to another infringement by the Sharks, this time in front of the posts, but Bristol, with their play-off place already assured, wanted to lay down a marker.

They went to the corner looking to use their lineout drive – an underrated facet of the West Countrymen’s armoury – but Sale held out once again.

It enabled Alex Sanderson’s men to get back into the contest and into the Bristol half, but they found a similarly stubborn rearguard.

The Sharks did create their best chance of the match when Luke James went surging down the right, but the visitors defended well.

It was ultimately a game about brutal physicality as both sides went toe-to-toe. The hits were unrelenting and neither team could find a breakthrough, leading to a rare scoreless half.

However, it did not remain that way for long and the deadlock was broken in typically brilliant fashion by the Bears in the second period.

Max Malins started the move, drawing in the defence and sending Semi Radradra away, and he fended off Faf de Klerk’s tackle with ease. After that, it was all about the support and the Fijian had it in the form of Charles Piutau, who took his pass and sent Earl across the whitewash.

The Sharks were struggling to find their rhythm, making a series of errors which allowed Bristol to defend their line relatively comfortably, but Sanderson introduced the replacements and they made a difference.

One of those to come on – lively scrum-half Raffi Quirke – was the spark, scything through the heart of the visiting defence.

Quirke stepped out of a number tackles until he was met by Radradra. However, it was an illegal high shot from the centre and he was duly banished to the sidelines for 10 minutes.

With the Bears down to 14 men, Sale took advantage and immediately levelled matters through Dan du Preez’s close-range surge.

It was to get even better for the hosts as AJ MacGinty’s superb cross-field was collected by Byron McGuigan and Rob du Preez was on hand to touch down, despite the final pass from McGuigan looking suspiciously forward.

The Television Match Official gave it the green light, though, and they built on that score to go over for a third time via Langdon.

Lloyd did cross the whitewash for Bristol, but MacGinty’s late penalty meant that Sale had secured their place in the top-four and also completed the double over the league leaders.

Gloucester leave it late to edge out London Irish

A last-minute penalty from Gloucester fly-half Billy Twelvetreees edged the Cherry and Whites to a 30-28 Premiership win over London Irish at Kingsholm.

Twelvetrees held his nerve to fire over a 40-metre kick to send a home crowd of 3,250 happy.

Tries from Santiago Carreras, Willi Heinz, Kyle Moyle and Louis Rees-Zammit earned Gloucester an additional bonus point with Twelvetrees adding two conversions and two penalties.

Curtis Rona, Will Goodrick-Clarke and Albert Tuisue scored tries for Irish with Paddy Jackson kicking three penalties and two conversion.