Premiership Watchability Rankings October 2017

With so much rugby on nowadays, it can be hard to decide exactly which matches to watch, which to wait for the highlights of, and which to avoid entirely knowing it’ll be an ugly penalty-only slog with all the pace and skill of a tranquilised sloth. Fortunately, RugbyPass are here to break down the Premiership’s most “watchable” teams after the first six rounds. We’ll take into account factors like the number of points scored and conceded, the drama of the matches, skilful play and notable moments. Think of it very much like the Robot Wars criteria, but with slightly less flaming metal.

4: Harlequins

Sitting at 7^th in the league, with a 3-3 record and a points difference of only 9, Harlequins have been neither outstanding nor terrible. They’ve scored a respectable 20 tries and conceded a reasonable 19. Why then are such a middling team included in our most watchable list? It’s mainly due to the manner in which Quins’ games have played out – 5 of the Premiership’s 27 yellow cards have been brandished at them meaning you can bank on plenty of dramatic twists and turns with the Stoop side. Individually, Quins have been impressive too. Danny Care is probably the in-form Scrum Half in the league with the most passes (473) and joint most try assists (5), Marland Yarde has made 13 clean breaks and Marcus Smith has all eyes on him as he looks to fill Nick Evans’ sizeable boots. However, given that Quins have yet to really consistently demonstrate what they’re capable of, and because they’ve conceded more penalties (70) than anyone else, they only rank fourth in our list this time around.

3: Sale Sharks

It’s perhaps somewhat surprising to see the 9^th placed team as part of our “most watchable” list, but Sale have scored 179 points and 24 tries this campaign and Byron McGuigan and Denny Solomona make up two thirds of the top three try scorers in the league.  Sale may not be the most fun team to support with only two wins so far, but if you want to see plenty of high-scoring games and free-running rugby the Sharks should be your go-to. That being said, it really depends where the Sharks are playing – they’ve only conceded 30 points at home which is the lowest in the league, but on the road they’ve dropped a massive 133, the highest by a long way. If you’re looking for a points-fest, Sale are always good value for money.

2: Saracens

The league leaders, top points scorers (205) and top try scorers (25), it would be absurd not to include Sarries in our round up. They’ve only lost once so far this season, in an unexpected early round defeat away at Bath which more than fulfilled our dramatic criteria. Saracens haven’t always played the most exciting brand of rugby, but they always do the basic stuff really, really well meaning that anyone with an appreciation of the nuances of rugby will find enjoyment in their performances. They even manage to make defence exciting with their patented “Wolfpack” philosophy, smothering opposition attacks and winning turnovers before they can even build an offensive platform. It’s this latter point however that means Saracens don’t rank higher on our list: when they don’t even give the opposition a chance to attack it means the result is too often inevitable and thus doesn’t always command the attention like other teams here. Frankly, Saracens are too good and should stop being so bloody selfish. It’s boring.

1: Northampton Saints

Our most watchable team after the opening six rounds goes to the team with the fastest bottom-to-top turnaround in Premiership history. Saints were absolutely abysmal in the opening round clash with Saracens, conceding 55 points and looking for all the world like a Sunday league pub team who’d accidentally wandered into Twickenham by mistake. However, since then Saints have produced some excellent performances to pull off impressive wins against tough opposition like Leicester and Bath and played arguably the best attacking rugby in the league whilst doing it. Three-times nominees for the Citizen Try of the Week, Saints have recovered from their initial drubbing to become a team who can seemingly score from anywhere. Their recent resurgence was marred somewhat by a perhaps surprising loss to Gloucester, but if anything Saints’ defensive vulnerabilities make them more interesting to watch on a purely entertainment basis. Probably not great for the blood pressure of the Franklin’s Gardens faithful though.