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

The young winger scored a hat-trick as Northampton secured maximum points from their first two Investec Champions Cup games with an eight-try thrashing of the Bulls.

Ollie Sleightholme crossed twice and Pollock secured the bonus point try inside an hour as a dominant Saints team cut loose 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 Tshakweni in the 53rd minute for a needless trip proved very costly and they failed to register a point in the final forty minutes.

England fly-half Smith added 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 win, following a 35-27 away win at Pau previously, means last year's losing finalists Northampton could not have hoped for a better start as they look to improve on that in this campaign.

Pretoria's number ten Wolhuter failed with an early penalty before the hosts took the lead when Henry Pollock broke before feeding Ollie Sleightholme who demonstrated his speed to sprint away to the line.

But an error from Sleightholme allowed the Bulls back into the game as the ball was knocked on in the tackle, allowing Pretoria winger Stravino Jacobs to kick on and show electric speed of his own to score after 22 minutes.

Shortly after, Saints had their second try as fast passing from Alex Mitchell at the ruck base and then Smith sent George 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 Bulls fly-half Kade Wolhuter who twice missed touch with penalty kicks to reinvite pressure onto the visitors.

That told after 48 minutes when Smith was again the creator, stepping inside to deceive the advancing defence before sending a perfectly weighted left-footed kick over the line for George Hendy to collect his second try and Saints' third score.

Bulls prop Alulutho Tshakweni was then shown a yellow card for a trip on Emmanuel Iyogun. Tshakweni was insistent he had been responding to a trip momentarily before by the Saints player but the incident from the Northampton substitute was ruled accidental when looked at by the match officials.

Saints seized the opportunity of having the extra man to secure the bonus point through Pollock before Alex Coles and Sleightholme scored as the home team notched three tries in five minutes.

George Hendy wrapped up his hat-trick with 12 minutes remaining and Josh Kemeny walked over for the eighth try of an outstanding day for Northampton in the dying moments.

Rerun of Last Year's Final Awaits Saints

The top two teams in the group meet in a rerun of the previous season's final when the Investec Champions Cup resumes in January as Saints travel to Bordeaux. The Saints then round off the group phase with a fixture at home against Scarlets on 18 January.

The Pretoria Bulls, who have one point from their opening two games, welcome Bristol Bears next before an away trip 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)