Northampton Saints Wheelchair Rugby head into new territory this weekend as the WR5s 2024 Premiership season gets underway.
Sunderland is the destination for the opening round of fixtures, which will see Saints take on old rivals Leicester Tigers as well as new opponents in the form of Help for Heroes, Berkshire Banshees and hosts, Northeast Barbarians.
The Premiership has seen a shake-up of teams after Bournemouth Lions were relegated and both West Country Hawks and Stoke Manderville Maulers opted to self-relegate.
“This is new territory for us,” said head coach Jamie Higgins. “It is the first year we have taken WR5s away from Aylesbury or Stoke.
“The guys are looking really strong. We have had a few players leave the club but we have had a few new players come in and develop.
“It will be really nice to go with a bit of a different squad to what we have played against previously and come up against those new teams.”
Jamie Higgins, Saints Wheelchair Rugby Head Coach
In the absence of Gerry McCrory, who is unavailable for Sunday’s trip to the Beacon of Light, Saints will be captained by Kascie Higgins and Rhys Walden.
“As a squad we have changed slightly,” added Higgins. “We are not taking two teams this season as we did last season, just with the movement of dates and where they are being played, we couldn’t quite get the commitment from players to be able to field two teams across all three fixtures. We have got a strong team that we are taking, it is a mix of our previous Premiership team and our Wanderers team that played down in Division 2 last year.”
Saints’ day starts against Help for Heroes (10.30am) before taking on Leicester Tigers (12pm). Berkshire Banshees (2pm) and Northeast Barbarians (3.30pm) concludes their Round 1 fixtures.
“It is a long journey so we want to make sure every player gets court time,” said Higgins. “We are helping develop them and we want to be competitive. Guys coming in to play Wheelchair Rugby are as competitive as any other member of the public that plays team sports. You don’t play team sports if you don’t have that little bit of competitiveness in you. They will be looking to go up, be competitive and see what we can do this season.”
After this weekend, Saints have further rounds in Coventry (27 April) and Stoke Manderville (12 May and 16 June).
