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

The young winger scored a hat-trick as the Saints secured maximum points from their opening two European games with an eight-try thrashing of the Bulls.

Ollie Sleightholme scored two tries and Pollock secured the fourth try inside an hour as a dominant Northampton side ran riot in the second half.

The visitors were still in the game with the score fourteen-five at the interval but a sin-binning to prop Alulutho Tshakweni in the 53rd minute for a unnecessary trip proved very costly and they failed to register a point in the second half.

England fly-half Fin Smith contributed 10 points from the tee as Saints went top 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 previously, means last year's losing finalists Northampton could not have asked for a better start as they look to improve on that this season.

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

But an mistake from the winger allowed the Bulls back into the game as the ball was knocked on in contact, allowing Pretoria winger Stravino Jacobs to kick on and show blistering pace of his own to reply after 22 minutes.

Shortly after, Saints had their second try as quick hands from Mitchell at the base of a ruck and then Fin Smith put Hendy over in the corner to make it 14-5 at the break.

Saints were dominant in both ball and field position 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 told after 48 minutes when Fin Smith was again the architect, stepping inside to wrong-foot the advancing defence before delivering a sweet left-footed kick over the line for Hendy to collect his second and Northampton's third.

Bulls prop Alulutho Tshakweni was then sin-binned for a trip on Emmanuel Iyogun. The prop was insistent 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 reviewed by the officials.

Saints capitalized of having the extra man to clinch the try bonus point through Pollock before Coles and Sleightholme scored as the hosts notched three tries in five minutes.

George Hendy completed his hat-trick with twelve minutes left on the clock and Kemeny strolled in for the eighth and final try of an outstanding afternoon for Saints in the final minute.

Rerun of Last Year's Final Next for Saints

The leading pair in the group will face off in a rematch of last year's final when the tournament returns in January as Saints head to Bordeaux-Bègles. The Saints then conclude the pool stage with a home game against Scarlets on January 18th.

The Bulls, who have one point from their opening two games, welcome Bristol 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)