Hendy Hat-Trick as Eight-Try Saints Rout Pretoria Bulls

The young winger bagged a triple as Northampton secured a perfect ten points from their first two European games with an eight-try thrashing of Pretoria.

Ollie Sleightholme scored two tries and Henry Pollock secured the fourth try before the hour mark as a commanding Saints team ran riot in the latter period.

The visitors were within touching distance with the score 14-5 at the interval but a sin-binning to prop Alulutho Tshakweni in the 53rd minute for a needless trip proved very costly and they did not score a point in the final forty minutes.

England fly-half Smith added 10 points with the boot as Saints went top of their pool on superior points difference from holders Bordeaux-Bègles with both sides on 10 points.

The nature of this win, coming after a 35-27 victory on the road at Section Paloise previously, means last season's runners-up Northampton could not have asked for a better start as they aim to improve on that in this campaign.

Pretoria's number ten Wolhuter failed with an early penalty before Saints opened the scoring when Henry Pollock made a break before feeding Sleightholme who showed his pace to sprint away to the line.

But an error from Sleightholme let the Bulls back in as the ball slipped from his grasp in the tackle, allowing Bulls wing Stravino Jacobs to hack the ball forward and show electric speed of his own to reply after 22 minutes.

Ten minutes later, Saints had their second as quick hands from Alex Mitchell at the ruck base and then Smith sent George Hendy over to make it fourteen to five at the half-time whistle.

Northampton were dominant in both ball and field position and were being given a helping hand from the opposition fly-half Wolhuter who twice missed touch with clearing penalties to reinvite pressure onto the visitors.

That told after 48 minutes when Fin Smith was again the creator, stepping inside to deceive the advancing defence before sending a sweet grubber kick over the line for George Hendy to grab his second try and Saints' third.

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

Northampton capitalized of having the numerical advantage to secure the bonus point through Pollock before Alex Coles and Ollie Sleightholme crossed as the home team registered three tries in five minutes.

Hendy completed his hat-trick with 12 minutes remaining and Kemeny strolled in for the eighth and final try of an excellent day for Saints in the final minute.

Rematch of Last Year's Final Next for Saints

The top two teams in the pool will face off in a rerun of last year's final when the tournament resumes in the new year as Northampton head to Bordeaux. Northampton then conclude the pool stage with a fixture at home against Scarlets on January 18th.

The Pretoria Bulls, who have one point from two matches, welcome Bristol Bears next before traveling to 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)