Hendy Scores Three as Eight-Try Saints Hammer Bulls

George Hendy bagged a triple as the Saints made it a perfect ten points from their opening two Investec Champions Cup games with an eight-try hammering of Pretoria.

Sleightholme crossed twice and Pollock secured the bonus point try before the hour mark as a dominant Saints team cut loose in the second half.

The Bulls were still in the game with the score 14-5 at the break but a sin-binning to prop Alulutho Tshakweni in the 53rd minute for a needless trip proved very costly and they failed to register a point in the second half.

England fly-half Smith contributed 10 points from the tee as Northampton went top of their pool on superior points difference from defending champions Bordeaux with both sides on 10 points.

The manner of this victory, coming after a 35-27 victory on the road at Pau last week, means last season's runners-up Saints could not have asked for a more ideal beginning as they aim to improve on that in this campaign.

Pretoria's number ten Wolhuter missed an early shot at goal before Saints opened the scoring when Pollock broke before feeding Ollie Sleightholme who demonstrated his speed to sprint away to the line.

But an error from Sleightholme allowed the Bulls back into the game as the ball slipped from his grasp in the tackle, allowing Bulls wing Jacobs to kick on and show blistering pace of his own to reply after 22 minutes.

Shortly after, Saints had their second try as fast passing from Alex Mitchell at the base of a ruck and then Fin Smith put Hendy over in the corner to make it fourteen to five at the break.

Northampton were on top in both ball and field position and were being aided from the opposition fly-half Wolhuter who twice missed touch with penalty kicks to bring the pressure back on the away side.

That told after 48 minutes when Smith was again the architect, stepping inside to wrong-foot the advancing defence before delivering a sweet left-footed kick over the line for George Hendy to grab his second and Saints' third score.

Pretoria forward Tshakweni was then shown a yellow card for a trip on Emmanuel Iyogun. The prop was adamant he had been responding to a trip momentarily before by Iyogun but the contact from the Saints replacement prop was ruled unintentional when looked at by the match officials.

Saints capitalized of having the extra man to secure the bonus point through Henry Pollock before Alex Coles and Ollie Sleightholme scored as the hosts registered three scores in five minutes.

Hendy wrapped up his triple with 12 minutes remaining and Josh Kemeny walked over for the eighth and final try of an excellent day for Saints in the dying moments.

Rerun of Last Season's Final Next for Saints

The top two teams in the group meet in a rematch of last year's final when the tournament resumes in January as Northampton travel to Bordeaux. Northampton then round off the pool stage with a fixture at home against the Scarlets on January 18th.

The Pretoria Bulls, who have one point from two matches, welcome Bristol Bears in their next outing before an away trip Pau.

Line-ups

Northampton: Furbank; Sleightholme, Hutchinson, Dingwall, Hendy; F Smith, Mitchell; Fischetti, Wright, Davison, Coles, Van der Mescht, Kemeny, Pearson, Pollock

Replacements: R Smith, Iyogun, Kundiona, Munga, Prowse, Graham, James, Thame

Bulls: Williams; Petersen, Gans, Vorster, Jacobs; Wolhuter, Burger; Tshakweni, Van der Merwe, Smith, Wiese, Van Heerden, Coetzee, Ludwig, Louw

Replacements: Else, Sithole, Mchunu, Gumede, Carr, Papier, Johannes, Van Niekerk

Yellow card: Tshakweni (53)

Match Officials

Referee: Hollie Davidson (Sco)

Assistant referees: Rob McDowell (Sco) and Dave Sutherland (Sco)

TMO: Mike Adamson (Sco)