Credit to the players for victory at Kingsholm says Dowson

Director of Rugby Phil Dowson gave all the credit to his players for finding a way to win in a thriller at Kingsholm, which saw Northampton Saints come away with a 35-37 victory in Round 2 of the Gallagher PREM.

A late clutch penalty from fly-half Anthony Belleau sealed the bonus point victory for the men in Black Green and Gold after a turbulent second-half, which at one point saw them down to 13 men.

“We spoke about what we learned from last week, and there are still things we need to be better at,” Dowson explained.

“Clearly, in that second half, there’s not a team in this league, particularly at home, that’s going to roll over, and we had to dig very deep.

“It wasn't helped by some injuries and some really poor discipline - three second-half yellow cards are unacceptable.

Unfortunately for Saints, it’s two weeks in a row where they have got out of the blocks to a dominant performance in the opening period and then struggled after the break.

However, to come away from a hostile environment at Kingsholm with the full five points heading into a derby weekend pleased the Director of Rugby.

Dowson continued: “We spoke a bit last week about how you get momentum back when you’ve lost it, and actually, credit to the players, we did that because to finish the game in their 22 with the ball, it spoke a lot to the lessons we learned.

“I wanted to keep the players ambitious and encourage them to play. What we didn’t want to do was to go into our shell and worry about making mistakes.

“One of the issues is that twice we’ve had front-rowers leave early in a game. If you run a front rower for 60, 70 minutes as we have done this week and last week, it’s going to take its toll. 

“Unfortunately, Cleopas had to go off - he was playing particularly well - and we had to go to uncontested scrums and were playing with a man less. 

“That, coupled with some poor discipline, meant we gave ourselves a mountain to climb - but we just about did it.”

Key to the victory once again was summer signing French international Anthony Belleau, who scored an impressive 17 points against Gloucester, including the vital final penalty, taking his tally to 25 points across the opening two rounds of the PREM.

“We did it thanks to Belleau’s nerves of steel as he capped a superb performance with the boot with the winning penalty,” said Dowson.

“Absolute credit to him for all of his kicking, because it was very windy, was outstanding.”

The men in Black, Green and Gold return home to a sold-out cinch Stadium at Franklin’s Gardens next weekend, for the visit of Leicester Tigers in Derby Weekend on Saturday (11 October, kick-off: 3.05pm).