There will come a time to truly judge the credentials of a Sale side whose solitary title success came nearly 20 years ago, but Friday night was not it. Not against a Newcastle team who surrendered so meekly during the opening 40 minutes that this clash was anything but the feisty northern derby it had been billed.
Alex Sanderson’s side were 31-0 up and in total control at half-time after running in five tries, before adding another four after the break in front of a paltry 5,785 crowd. There will be far greater challenges for Sale. There has to be. It cannot always be this easy.
Still, for Sanderson the nine-try blitz was a welcome antidote to last week’s defeat at champions Bath and a reminder of Sale’s strength on home soil with a second bonus-point victory of the season in Salford. For England coach Steve Borthwick, there were also plenty of reasons for optimism from a Sale perspective, with winger Tom Roebuck claiming centre stage with a clinical hat-trick.
“Tom has been training with a sprint coach down at Loughborough and that’s not just him – a few of the squad go down,” said Sanderson. “It looked like it showed with how he stepped in off the right foot coming infield. I don’t think he’d hit his straps so far this season, so there were conversations with him this week about him actually stepping up. He trained really well and goes and performs like that.”
For Newcastle, still in the early throes of their post-Red Bull takeover reconstruction, this was another night to forget as they slumped to a third straight defeat. They lie in familiar territory at the bottom of the table and have already conceded a whopping 134 points.
Coach Alan Dickens defended his players after their abject first-half display, saying: “I would never question their desire. Every time they step on the field they put their bodies on the line.”
Sale’s Nathan Jibulu, advancing past the challenge of Newcastle’s Tom Gordon, made another big impact after coming on. Photograph: Jan Kruger/Getty Images for Sale Sharks
Sale were missing the Curry twins through injury but Luke Cowan-Dickie made his first appearance since featuring in the British and Irish Lions’ summer tour of Australia.
The England hooker will hope to feature in next month’s autumn internationals along with the likes of Joe Carpenter, Roebuck, George Ford, Bevan Rodd and Asher Opoku-Fordjour. They also started against Newcastle and quickly made their mark as Sale steamrollered into a ludicrously easy half-time lead.
Borthwick is also keen to secure the services of Sale defensive guru Byron McGuigan for England’s autumn campaign and negotiations are continuing with the RFU.
McGuigan prowled the touchline as Rob du Preez dived over from close range for the opening try before Roebuck scored his first after driving through the heart of a leaden-footed Newcastle defence.
The Red Bulls struggled to escape their 22-metre line and, after centre Max Clark was sinbinned for persistent offending, Cowan-Dickie bustled over from close range for Sale’s third.
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Captain Ernst van Rhyn crashed over for the bonus-point try in the 34th minute while Cowan-Dickie then earned a yellow card for a foul.
However, Scotland wing Arron Reed added an exhilarating fifth on the stroke of half-time, racing on to a delightful grubber kick from Du Preez to score in the left corner.
Newcastle refused to throw in the towel and Elliott Obatoyinbo showed impressive strength to manoeuvre his way over the line early in the second half as they finally got on the scoreboard. That drew a cheer from the small band of travelling supporters but normal service was soon resumed when Roebuck glided his way through another defensive gap to score his second.
Replacement Nathan Jibulu then showed his growing importance to Sale with his third Prem try in as many games this season before brilliantly setting up Reed for his second.
The hooker burst down the right flank and then showed intelligence to find Reed and the speedy winger did the rest to complete his brace before Roebuck squeezed over for his hat-trick score at the death.
