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It might go down as Noah Caluori’s most frustrating day in a Saracens shirt. Yet such is the momentum behind their late-season surge, it could not prevent Mark McCall’s side from leapfrogging Bristol into fifth and moving to within three points of the play-offs.
Saracens won their fourth match in a row and have in effect turned the final-day clash with fourth-placed Exeter Chiefs, who suffered a surprising defeat by Harlequins on Saturday, into a quarter-final.
Caluori, the leading tryscorer in the Gallagher Prem, however, had a day to forget. He knocked on with the tryline at his mercy and failed to dominate the skies, as has been his way in this breakout season. Yet individual discontent brought collective joy as Saracens instead made a matchwinner out of their other wing, Rotimi Segun.
“At times he is undefendable, this has been his best season at the club by miles,” McCall, Saracens’ director of rugby, said of Segun. “People don’t see how brilliant a defender he is and, with the ball, he’s as good as anyone.
“He has not played for England but this is the year he might get into the conversation. He’s playing as well as anyone.”
Saracens had the game won inside the first quarter by turning left instead of right. In the previous ten league games involving Caluori the Londoners had habitually fed the teen in the No4 shirt and been rewarded with 18 tries. Not unreasonably Gloucester anticipated more of the same. So they were as surprised as anyone that Caluori was left standing in splendid isolation on one touchline while the home side went the other way to great effect.
Saracens’ win moves them three points off the final play-off spot as they look to give McCall a fitting send-offMatthew Lewis/Getty Images
Segun, 29, had scored eight tries himself in those ten games but Gloucester were slow to identify the threat when they overthrew a lineout in the seventh minute. Tom Willis tidied up and Fergus Burke straightened.
Out wide Caluori waved his hands and, as the visitors twitched, Burke slipped the ball to Max Malins on his left shoulder. The full back accelerated before linking with Segun, who did the rest.
Another lineout followed soon after and again Segun made hay. This time Maro Itoje secured possession and Ben Earl attacked off the base going right. Gloucester kept their spacing for fear of Caluori going round the outside.
Earl identified the scenario and found Segun, straightening impressively before ripping up the guts. A tap tackle slowed his progress but the Londoner, who signed a new deal in January, was too athletic to be denied.
Earl scored Saracens’ final try in their confident win over GloucesterMatthew Lewis/Getty Images
There were 13 minutes on the clock and 15 points on the scoreboard. By the standards of this crazy Prem campaign it appeared a far from terminal situation for the visitors. Yet it felt that way in the ground and looked that way from Gloucester’s body language.
They had arrested a pretty desperate season with back-to-back wins against Exeter and Sale Sharks on their previous two outings. It lifted them above Harlequins and into the eighth and final Champions Cup qualifying place. When Quins responded with a shock win over Exeter at Allianz Stadium just before kick-off at the StoneX, George Skivington’s men were reminded that their job was nowhere near done. Against lesser opponents it might have produced a reaction. But not Saracens, in their late-season mood.
Even the scrum, where Gloucester have enjoyed conspicuous success this term, turned ugly for them. Saracens had just too much power to accompany their laser focus. They did not give an inch.
Earl, very much at the top of his game, bullocked over after fine work by Theo McFarland and Nick Tompkins, before another lineout offered up a bonus point to the home side. Theo Dan, newly arrived, threw in, regathered and scored before Gloucester knew what day it was.
It was a frustrating afternoon for the league’s top tryscorer, CaluoriMatthew Lewis/Getty Images
Still Caluori waited for his moment, cutting an increasingly frustrated figure. It finally arrived on 65 minutes, at which point he snatched at it, knocking the ball over the tryline.
It actually did not get any better for Saracens after that as Gloucester belatedly came onto their game and Will Joseph scored two excellent tries in the closing ten minutes.
There was still time for Owen Farrell to find a new way to make a name for himself. With Dan in the sin-bin Sarries had nobody to throw into the lineout. Up stepped England’s record points-scorer, nailing two out of three.
It brought a smile to the face of McCall, who steps down this summer knowing the dream of a seventh league title is still alive. “Six weeks ago we knew it wasn’t in our hands at all,” he said. “It is now.”
Saracens M Malins; N Caluori, N Tompkins, O Hartley, R Segun (T Elliott 58min); F Burke (O Farrell 50), C Bracken (I van Zyl 53); R Carre (E Mawi 45), J George (T Dan 50; sin bin 73), M Street (A Clarey 22-32, 40), M Itoje, N Isiekwe, T McFarland (H Tizard 56), B Earl (N Michelow 63), T Willis.
Gloucester G Barton (J Edwards-Giraud 10); W Joseph, M Llewellyn, S Atkinson, B Loader; C Atkinson, C Englefield (M Austin 71); V Rapava Ruskin (D Bleuler 33), S Blake (J Innard 23-32, 53), A Fasogbon (C Knight 53), A Clark, M Alemanno (D Gwynne 56), F Thomas, J Venter (D Eite 64), W Trenholm (J Clement 53).