'These are the special games and they have the gravitas'

Sale boss Alex Sanderson hasn’t shied away from acknowledging the importance of this Saturday’s trip by his unbeaten Sharks to Leicester, the home of the defending Gallagher Premiership champions. It was January 2021 when the ex-Saracens assistant took the Manchester club to Mattioli Woods Welford Road in what was his first outing as the director of rugby in succession to Steve Diamond.

Sanderson’s side emerged triumphant that day, winning 25-15 in a contest that took place behind closed doors. Seventeen months later, though, the roles were very much reversed as Steve Borthwick had transformed the Tigers from a back-to-back eleventh-placed club into the champions of England with Sale falling off the pace and failing to make the playoffs.

A month into this new season, though, and Sale are motoring. Three wins from three is an unbeaten record that only Sanderson’s old club Saracens can match – and the Sharks are now heading to Tigers having seen Mark McCall’s team do an almighty number on the title holders last weekend in London.

A round five win for Sale then would be a statement victory despite it still being early days in the campaign. “It would be a strong message, it really is and we weren’t that far off last year looking back at it (19-11 last October). It is the biggest challenge we have had with the start we have had and maintaining that kind of intensity,” said Sanderson to RugbyPass.

“Then at the end of the day, it is just another week. We haven’t won anything if we beat Leicester, it is just a result on the road. But we want to make every week special, like a cup final week. These weeks where you face the champions on their ground, these are the special games and they have the gravitas.”

Asked if he had been on the phone with his pal Mark McCall to get the Saracens blueprint on how to dismantle Leicester, Sanderson quipped: “Back in the day he would (give me it) but we are a little too close in the competition in competitive terms.

“Whether he knows this or not, I spoke to Ian Peel after the game, the Saracens forwards coach, I had a little chat with him about what happened. But the Leicester side that everybody saw last week will not be the Leicester team in either personnel or strategy that plays this weekend. We are fully aware of that.”