Sale vs Quins - Sunday 3pm

[Puja]

Sale Sharks v Harlequins

Sale Sharks: 15 Joe Carpenter, 14 Tom Roebuck, 13 Rob du Preez, 12 Manu Tuilagi, 11 Arron Reed, 10 George Ford, 9 Gus Warr, 8 Jean-Luc du Preez, 7 Sam Dugdale, 6 Ben Curry (c), 5 Josh Beaumont, 4 Cobus Wiese, 3 James Harper, 2 Luke Cowan-Dickie, 1 Bevan Rodd
Replacements: 16 Tommy Taylor, 17 Simon McIntyre, 18 WillGriff John, 19 Ben Bamber, 20 Hyron Andrews, 21 Raffi Quirke, 22 Sam James, 23 Tom O’Flaherty

Harlequins: 15 Tyrone Green, 14 Cadan Murley, 13 Oscar Beard, 12 Andre Esterhuizen, 11 Louis Lynagh, 10 Marcus Smith, 9 Will Porter, 8 Alex Dombrandt, 7 Will Evans, 6 Chandler Cunningham-South, 5 Stephan Lewies (c), 4 Irne Herbst, 3 Dillon Lewis, 2 Sam Riley, 1 Joe Marler
Replacements: 16 Jack Walker, 17 Fin Baxter, 18 Simon Kerrod, 19 George Hammond, 20 Tom Lawday, 21 Danny Care, 22 Jarrod Evans, 23 Luke Northmore

Venue: Salford Stadium
Kick-off: 15:00 BST
Referee: Tom Foley
Assistant Referees: Hamish Smales, John Meredith
TMO: Dean Richards

[Scrumhead]

Quins don’t have a great record in the ‘Enya’ fixture.

I’m hoping that we can keep up our recent form, but Sale are usually pretty good at dragging us into an arm wrestle. That said, this isn’t the most physical Sale lineup I’ve seen, so we’ll see.

[16th man]

Yeah, not winning any arm wrestles when we've got Beaumont at lock.

[Mikey Brown]

Yeah, not winning any arm wrestles when we've got Beaumont at lock.

It’s really odd thinking back to a time he was looked at as a potential future England 8.

[Scrumhead]

In his early career Beaumont was a serious prospect. Athletic, skilful, quick in a rangy way and a good lineout forward. Injuries cost him a lot of what made him look good.

[16th man]

In his early career Beaumont was a serious prospect. Athletic, skilful, quick in a rangy way and a good lineout forward. Injuries cost him a lot of what made him look good.

Very much this. Plus even if he hadn't been hampered by injury, he was never a Billy V type player, so he would likely have been tried once or twice, with instructions to try to play that game, failed and been cast aside anyway.

[Oakboy]

In his early career Beaumont was a serious prospect. Athletic, skilful, quick in a rangy way and a good lineout forward. Injuries cost him a lot of what made him look good.

Very much this. Plus even if he hadn't been hampered by injury, he was never a Billy V type player, so he would likely have been tried once or twice, with instructions to try to play that game, failed and been cast aside anyway.

Good point about BV. Do you think Earl's success in the 8 shirt is finally letting us move on to something more constructive? Maybe, SB would not waste a 'Simmonds' now.

[16th man]

In his early career Beaumont was a serious prospect. Athletic, skilful, quick in a rangy way and a good lineout forward. Injuries cost him a lot of what made him look good.

Very much this. Plus even if he hadn't been hampered by injury, he was never a Billy V type player, so he would likely have been tried once or twice, with instructions to try to play that game, failed and been cast aside anyway.

Good point about BV. Do you think Earl's success in the 8 shirt is finally letting us move on to something more constructive? Maybe, SB would not waste a 'Simmonds' now.

I think at this point of his tenure, Spock's Beard is showing some willingness to experiment with approach and using the right players for each, as shown by using Earl at 8 to attack gaps, and the willingness to switch fullbacks for different game plans.

[Scrumhead]

In his early career Beaumont was a serious prospect. Athletic, skilful, quick in a rangy way and a good lineout forward. Injuries cost him a lot of what made him look good.

Very much this. Plus even if he hadn't been hampered by injury, he was never a Billy V type player, so he would likely have been tried once or twice, with instructions to try to play that game, failed and been cast aside anyway.

Good point about BV. Do you think Earl's success in the 8 shirt is finally letting us move on to something more constructive? Maybe, SB would not waste a 'Simmonds' now.

In answer to your question above, I think the answer is yes. Although it would be interesting to see who is considered second choice behind Earl.

I’m still not convinced Simmonds really was wasted. As I said at the time, he was an excellent in a system intended to maximise his strengths. Earl has performed a similar role without compromises being made for him. Simmonds relative lack of impact at Montpellier in comparison to Mercer reinforces that point IMO.

[16th man]

Not able to watch, but the BBC website suggests that Bamber has managed to be subbed on in the 54th minute and sin binned in the 55th.

[Mikey Brown]

Well that was an odd game. 2 LBPs is a good return for how inaccurate Quins were. Both scrum-halves pretty shoddy. The game was definitely there to be taken but Sale probably deserve it overall.

[fivepointer]

Quins very slow out of the blocks, which ultimately cost them, plus the chargedown try which stalled their comeback. They didnt really help themselves.

[Puja]

Not able to watch, but the BBC website suggests that Bamber has managed to be subbed on in the 54th minute and sin binned in the 55th.

Poor sod copped a 'too many team offences' yellow card for being a step offside as Quins attacked fast.

Puja