Northampton thrash Bath 71-48 in second-highest scoring game in Premiership history

Northampton Saints produced a devastating attacking display to defeat Bath 71-48 at DPD Stadium at Franklin’s Gardens, in what became the second-highest scoring game in Gallagher Premiership history. Eighteen tries were scored across an extraordinary contest that left both coaches searching for explanations.

Saints director of rugby Phil Dowson pointed to a fundamental change in how teams approach the game as the reason behind increasingly high-scoring matches. “There have been some rule changes from a kicking point of view that’s opened the game up and the best ball to play off is broken field, counter attack turnover ball,” he said. “I think the ability of teams now — all teams — have an appetite to move the ball on the counter attack first before kicking first, so I think there’s a different mindset.”

Dowson was careful to acknowledge the tension between entertainment and the integrity of the sport. “We don’t want it to be 99-88 — not basketball, and I hear that in the media from some coaches — but we also don’t want 9-3, so we’ve got to find a balance in how we run the game. But at the moment there are lots of Saints fans happy.”

Northampton’s 11-try haul was headlined by a hat-trick from Sleightholme, with further scores from Fin Smith, Tommy Freeman (two), Fraser Dingwall, James Pater, Josh Kemeny, Alex Mitchell and Alex Coles. The 71 points Bath conceded equalled the record they leaked in a 71-17 hammering by Saracens in October 2021.

Bath were far from passive, with Tom Carr-Smith, Charlie Griffin, Archie Griffin, Arthur Green (two), Santi Carreras and Josh Bayliss crossing for the visitors. Bath director of rugby Johann van Graan noted his side actually led 29-26 at half-time and extended that advantage to 10 points early in the second half before the game turned.

“One of the themes of the game was we gave them quite a few tries through our mistakes,” van Graan said. “In minutes 50 to 60 we lost the penalty battle and ultimately across the 80 minutes we conceded two yellow cards, which was costly for us. They punished us on our mistakes. We’ve had some fantastic battles over the years and they were better than us in the last 20 minutes of the game.”