Phil Dowson attempts to explain bizarre scoreline in PREM top-dog scrap

Northampton Saints director of rugby Phil Dowson thinks high-scoring matches such as his side’s thumping 71-48 victory over Bath is due to teams shifting in mindset in recent years.

Eighteen tries were scored in what was an extraordinary contest at DPD Stadium at Franklin’s Gardens that became the second-highest scoring game in Gallagher PREM history.

While Saints celebrated at the end, the tally Bath conceded equalled the record amount they leaked in the 71-17 hammering they suffered against Saracens in October 2021.

Dowson said: “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. You get a lot more of that.

“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.

“I think risk is being rewarded more often and there’s the actual skill level of the playing group.

“You can talk about the underfoot conditions, the way it’s being refereed, all that sort of stuff, you’re still seeing tons of turnover at the breakdown.

“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 scored 11 tries in what was a devastating attacking display, with Sleightholme running in a hat-trick and Fin Smith, Tommy Freeman (two), Fraser Dingwall, James Pater, Josh Kemeny, Alex Mitchell and Alex Coles also crossing.

Tom Carr-Smith, Charlie Griffin, Archie Griffin, Arthur Green (two), Santi Carreras and Josh Bayliss replied for an overrun Bath.

Their director of rugby, Johann van Graan, said: “I thought both teams started at a big speed.

“We scored some good tries, they scored some good tries, we scored the bonus-point try in the 33rd minute and one of the themes of the game was we gave them quite a few tries through our mistakes.

“We go 29-26 up at half-time, we come out firing in the second half, we go 10 points up, we exited a contestable with a scrum, we knocked the ball on and they kicked it through, so we gave them quite a few ins.

“In minutes 50 to 60 we lost the penalty battle and ultimately across the 80 minutes we conceded two yellow cards (for Bayliss and Ollie Lawrence), which was costly for us.

“Ultimately, 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.”