George Hendy Hat-Trick as Eight-Try Northampton Hammer Pretoria Bulls

The young winger scored a hat-trick as the Saints made it a perfect ten points from their first two Investec Champions Cup games with an eight-try hammering of the Bulls.

Sleightholme scored two tries and Henry Pollock secured the bonus point try before the hour mark as a commanding Saints team cut loose in the second half.

The Bulls were within touching distance with the score 14-5 at the break but a yellow card to prop Alulutho Tshakweni in the 53rd minute for a needless trip proved very costly and they failed to register a point in the final forty minutes.

International Smith contributed 10 points from the tee as Saints moved to the summit of their pool on points difference from defending champions Bordeaux-Bègles with the two teams on 10 points.

The nature of this victory, coming after a 35-27 away win at Section Paloise last week, means last year's losing finalists Saints could not have hoped for a better start as they aim to improve on that in this campaign.

Bulls fly-half Kade Wolhuter failed with an early penalty before the hosts opened the scoring when Pollock made a break before feeding Sleightholme who demonstrated his speed to race clear to the try line.

But an mistake from the winger allowed the Bulls back into the game as the ball slipped from his grasp in contact, allowing Bulls wing Jacobs to hack the ball forward and show electric speed of his own to reply after 22 minutes.

Ten minutes later, Northampton had their second as fast passing from Alex Mitchell at the ruck base and then Fin Smith sent George Hendy over in the corner to make it fourteen to five at the break.

Saints were dominant in possession and territory and were being aided from the opposition fly-half Kade Wolhuter who failed to find touch with clearing penalties to bring the pressure back on the visitors.

That proved decisive after 48 minutes when Smith was again the creator, stepping inside to wrong-foot the advancing defence before delivering a perfectly weighted grubber kick over the line for George Hendy to grab his second and Saints' third.

Pretoria forward Tshakweni was then shown a yellow card for a trip on Emmanuel Iyogun. Tshakweni was adamant he had been responding to a trip just prior by the Saints player but the contact from the Saints replacement prop was ruled accidental when reviewed by the match officials.

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

Hendy wrapped up his hat-trick with twelve minutes left on the clock and Kemeny walked over for the eighth try of an outstanding afternoon for Northampton in the dying moments.

Rerun of Last Year's Final Awaits Saints

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

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