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Saracens, Sale name their Gallagher Premiership final teams

Saracens' Mako Vunipola (Photo by Mark Pain/PA Images via Getty Images)

Saracens have named their team to take on Sale on Saturday’s Gallagher Premiership final at Twickenham, making one surprise change from their May 13 semi-final win over Northampton.

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Mako Vuniopla was the starting loosehead in the 38-15 victory over the Saints at the StoneX, but the England prop has only been chosen on the bench for the final with his starting place going to the promoted Eroni Mawi.

The only other Saracens change is on their bench with Aled Davies, who has recovered from a hamstring issue, restored as their back-up scrum-half at the expense of American Ruben de Haas.

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RugbyPass Offload | Episode 78 | Jack Nowell

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RugbyPass Offload | Episode 78 | Jack Nowell

The number of Sale alterations mirrors Saracens, with just one change to their starting pack and a single tweak to their replacements.

With Ben Curry a first-half casualty in the 21-13 semi-final win over Leicester, his place in the starting back row is taken by Sam Dugdale.

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Dan du Preez didn’t last long when came off the bench against the Tigers and his spot in the reserves is filled by Tom Ellis.

Saracens skipper Owen Farrell said: “These games are the reason you play and that makes it so exciting. We have worked hard this year and the lads have done a brilliant job to put us in this position, but we want to make sure we finish it off.

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“Last year is in the past. It took us a while to think about how to get the best out of ourselves, but we have made some good steps forward this season and hopefully that is shown on Saturday.”

SARACENS: 15. Alex Goode; 14. Max Malins, 13. Alex Lozowski, 12. Nick Tompkins, 11. Sean Maitland, 10 Owen Farrell (capt), 9. Ivan Van Zyl; 1. Eroni Mawi, 2. Jamie George, Marco Riccioni, 4. Maro Itoje, 5. Hugh Tizard, 6. Nick Isiekwe, 7. Ben Earl, 8. Jackson Wray. Reps: 16. Theo Dan, 17. Mako Vunipola, 18. Christian Judge, 19. Callum Hunter-Hill, 20. Toby Knight, 21. Aled Davies, 22. Duncan Taylor, 23. Elliot Daly.

SALE: 15. Joe Carpenter; 14. Tom Roebuck, 13. Rob du Preez, 12. Manu Tuilagi, 11. Arron Reed; 10. George Ford, 9. Gus Warr; 1. Simon McIntyre, 2. Akker van der Merwe, 3. Nick Schonert, 4. Jean-Luc du Preez, 5. Jonny Hill, 6. Tom Curry, 7. Sam Dugdale, 8. Jono Ross (capt). Reps: 16. Ewan Ashman, 17. Bevan Rodd, 18. Coenie Oosthuizen, 19. Josh Beaumont, 20. Tom Ellis, 21. Raffi Quirke, 22. Sam James, 23. Tom O’Flaherty.

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J
JW 1 hour ago
Why Les Kiss and Stuart Lancaster can lead Australia to glory

It is now 22 years since Michael Lewis published his groundbreaking treatise on winning against the odds

I’ve never bothered looking at it, though I have seen a move with Clint as a scout/producer. I’ve always just figured it was basic stuff for the age of statistics, is that right?

Following the Moneyball credo, the tailor has to cut his cloth to the material available

This is actually a great example of what I’m thinking of. This concept has abosolutely nothing to do with Moneyball, it is simple being able to realise how skillsets tie together and which ones are really revelant.


It sounds to me now like “moneyball” was just a necessity, it was like scienctest needing to come up with some random experiment to make all the other world scholars believe that Earth was round. The American sporting scene is very unique, I can totally imagine one of it’s problems is rich old owners not wanting to move with the times and understand how the game has changed. Some sort of mesiah was needed to convert the faithful.


While I’m at this point in the article I have to say, now the NRL is a sport were one would stand up and pay attention to the moneyball phenom. Like baseball, it’s a sport of hundreds of identical repetitions, and very easy to data point out.

the tailor has to cut his cloth to the material available and look to get ahead of an unfair game in the areas it has always been strong: predictive intelligence and rugby ‘smarts’

Actually while I’m still here, Opta Expected Points analysis is the one new tool I have found interesting in the age of data. Seen how the random plays out as either likely, or unlikely, in the data’s (and algorithms) has actually married very closely to how I saw a lot of contests pan out.


Engaging return article Nick. I wonder, how much of money ball is about strategy as apposed to picks, those young fella’s got ahead originally because they were picking players that played their way right? Often all you here about is in regards to players, quick phase ruck ball, one out or straight up, would be were I’d imagine the best gains are going to be for a data driven leap using an AI model of how to structure your phases. Then moving to tactically for each opposition.

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