This convincing win for Glasgow in their final pool match was a bitter-sweet experience for the Scotstoun men.
On the day, they did everything required of them in order to keep their quarter-final dream alive, but slip-ups earlier in the tournament mean they must now cross their fingers and hope Racing 92 and Toulouse do them a favour (against Saracens and Gloucester, respectively) today.
Warriors are in the eighth and final quarter-final qualifying place with 17 league points in the bag, while Saracens and Gloucester have 14 each, meaning that if either of those sides pick up a win then they will progress into the knock-out phases. Indeed, if Saracens draw and score four tries to pick up an extra bonus-point, they will progress ahead of Glasgow on aggregate points differential.
Adding further intrigue was the news yesterday that Saracens will be automatically relegated from the English Premiership at the end of this season for failing to get their player payments back under the league’s salary cap. It will be fascinating to see if this devastating news knocks the fight out of the reigning European champions.
Saracens are at home against Racing 92, so Warriors will be hoping their talismanic former stand-off Finn Russell can inspire his French team-mates to raise their game.
Gloucester, meanwhile, head to Toulouse looking for the win they need – where they will be officiated by an all-Scottish team led by former Warriors utility-back Mike Adamson.
Warriors head coach Dave Rennie will be in an aeroplane headed for Australia when all of this is going on. With Warriors now out of action until February 14, he is using the break to do some reconnaissance for his next coaching assignment. He will find out his team’s fate when he takes a pit-stop in Dubai, and would have much preferred to have it all sorted out before now.
“We probably did enough to get five points last week [against Exeter Chiefs] but didn’t, and the loss at home to La Rochelle was a killer because we definitely had more than enough opportunity there, but it is what it is,” he said. “We’ve been playing a lot better footie recently, the last month has been far more clinical, but we’ve got no control of what happens from here – so we’ll just have to see how results go tomorrow.”
In this match, Leone Nakarawa – only two minutes into his Warriors second-coming – got the ball rolling when he muscled over from close range, following an initial dent from winger DTH van der Merwe.
It went from bad to worse for Sale when they lost their skipper Jono Ross to the sin-bin after his forearm made contact with a Glasgow head post-tackle, and the visitors took immediate advantage by kicking to the corner so they could set up a line-out drive which allowed Fraser Brown to flop over.
An Ali Price snipe and an excellent support line from van der Merwe secured the third try with the clock still two minutes shy of the half-hour mark and, despite having lost Nakarawa to the sin-bin for re-entering a maul from the side, they snatched the bonus point early in the second half, when Sam Johnson capitalised from Adam Hastings’ quick tap-penalty.
Sale got points on the board when replacement prop Jake Cooper-Woolley squeezed over after Deny Solomona had hunted down his one kick ahead on the right, but that was the only blip in a commanding second half for Warriors. Hastings slotted a penalty and Jonny Gray rumbled in for try number five just after the hour mark.
George Turner – who was a handful throughout his 23 minutes on the park – finished off the scoring in style when he came back against the grain to hit a devastating line off a Hastings pop-pass then showed the pace and balance of a thoroughbred outside-centre to slalom past three defenders on his way to the line.
“I’m really rapt with that,” said Rennie, with regard to his team’s performance. “The boys worked hard. We held on to a lot of ball and generating some quick ball which put them under pressure.”
Scorers, Sale: Try: Cooper-Woolley; Con: Curtis.
Glasgow Warriors: Tries: Nakarawa, Brown, van der Merwe, Johnson, Gray, Taylor; Con: Hastings 6; Pen: Hastings.
Sale Sharks: J Carpenter (C Redpath 48, B Carlile 73)); D Solomona (T Roebuck 59), L James, J Williams, M Yarde; T Curtis (J Carpenter 67), W Cliff (F Warr 59); R Harrison, C Langdon (R Webber 48), W John ((J Cooper-Woolley 48), M Postlewhaite, J Phillips, T Curry, B Curry (C Neild 50), J Ross (S Dugdale 59).
Glasgow Warriors: G Bryce; D Van Der Merwe (N Matawalu 59), H Jones, S Johnson (P Horne 48), K Steyn; A Hastings, A Price (G Horne 57); A Seiuli (O Kebble 49), F Brown (G Turner 57), Z Fagerson (A Nicol, 65), S Cummings, J Gray, L Nakarawa, T Gordon (C Fusaro 65), R Wilson (R Harley 52).
Referee: Pascal Gauzère
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