Following the conclusion of round 12 of the 2025/26 PREM season, here are our five key takeaways from the latest block of fixtures.
Big Match Bonanza a hit
The PREM has taken a huge step forward this season across the board, and Saturday’s Big Game Bonanza was yet another example of this new era.
Big events are nothing new in the PREM. After all, Quins have held 18 festive Big Games alongside four Big Summer Kick-Off’s, while Saracens have had five editions of The Showdown and Bristol enjoyed their Big Day Out last year as well. But never before have three bigs been held on the same day, one after the other.
That was exactly what happened on Saturday, and it proved a hit across the board with a cumulative attendance of nearly 120,000 across the three showpiece games.
The PREM needs to keep branching out into things like this; it needs to keep experimenting with new ideas and trying to push the boat out. It shows the ambition is there to back up the action on the pitch.
Credit where credit is due, this weekend felt like a success.
Geoff Parling-gate
If you didn’t see the Geoff Parling incident with TNT Sports, either live as it was happening or on social media, then you must be living under a rock.
While a lot of the talk did, and deservedly so, focus on the rugby this weekend, it’s hard to ignore that the only genuinely viral moment came courtesy of an Alan Partridge-esque moment before the Leicester Tigers versus Gloucester game at Villa Park.
I won’t go into detail over it, because it’s been covered by virtually every rugby website and every Fleet Street publication you can think of, but the whole thing was pretty funny when you think about it.
You’d think it was like a major referendum the way the discourse has been carried out on social media, but it’s really very simple. Was Parling right to be annoyed? Yes. Was he right to push the TV presenter? No.
Should the matter be concluded now that both parties have apologised? Absolutely.
But let’s still use the memes because, let’s face it, it was pretty funny when you look back.
Away days
While there were only two teams technically playing ‘at home’ this weekend, all five matches were won by the ‘away side’ in a rare feat.
Winning away from home has become a tough ask in the PREM. Only Bath and Northampton have managed five wins on the road, while Exeter, Leicester and Bristol have won just three of their six away games.
On the flip side, home wins are rife. Leicester remain unbeaten at Mattioli Woods Welford Road, while Northampton, Exeter, Bath and Bristol have lost just once apiece on home soil. Even underneath them, Saracens and Sale have won three of their six home games this year.
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This weekend showed that teams can certainly do the business on their travels and could possibly flick the switch in that regard, which will only add more fuel to the fire looking towards the latter stages and the play-offs as well.
Set in stone?
After round 11, it seemed there were five clear play-off hopefuls. After round 12, it seems the top four are starting to get set in stone.
Yet again, Bath, Leicester and Exeter secured maximum points for their efforts against Sale, Gloucester and Newcastle, while Northampton also claimed a huge win over Saracens. Bristol, however, lost to Harlequins, and it’s a defeat that could have huge ramifications for them moving forward.
As a result of that loss, Pat Lam’s side sit seven points behind fourth-placed Exeter and eight points behind Leicester in third with just six rounds left of the regular season. It might not seem like a big gap, but Bristol will now have to secure at least two wins more than the teams above them to get back into the top four.
Looking at the run in, it seems easier said than done as well. Bristol have Gloucester, Newcastle, Saracens, Northampton, Bath and Sale to come between now and the end of the regular season.
On paper, that could be a run of six wins from six, but then you factor in that three of them are away from home. The Bears have struggled to find consistent form away from Ashton Gate this season in the PREM, winning three of their six thus far, but they have shown they can do it.
After all, they did an Investec Champions Cup job on the Bulls in Pretoria. A realistic run for Bristol is probably four wins from six, meaning they need one of the sides around them to win only two.
That is certainly doable looking at Exeter and Leicester’s respective fixtures, with the Chiefs taking on Northampton, Gloucester, Bath, Harlequins, Leicester and Saracens and Leicester still to play Newcastle, Saracens, Northampton, Sale, Exeter and Bath. Either way, Bristol will now just be hoping for teams to slip up rather than dictating their own future.
The fate of the play-off race lies in the hands of those currently in the top four moving forward.
Drop offs
While the gap between the top five is still fairly tight, the drop off between them and the chasing pack only got bigger at the weekend.
Only one of the bottom five sides in the league won, with Harlequins beating Bristol at the Principality, and only two of the remaining four came away with bonus points, with Sale notching two and Saracens getting one. That said, though, both of those sides were in winning positions before conceding late on.
All of their defeats had a similar feel to them, which is slightly puzzling. They were just so far away from the sides that we saw last year. Gloucester lacked accuracy in attack, which cost them their own chances but also gifted Leicester some in the process, while Sale and even Saracens would have closed their respective games out.
It just serves as a real metaphor for where each of the teams are right now.
After factoring in their results, the gap between each of those sides is just staggering. Saracens sit 11 points above Sale, who then sit six points above Harlequins and seven above Gloucester, who are also eight and nine points above Newcastle.
If it wasn’t clear already, the PREM is currently a two-tiered league and round 12 just cemented that feeling.