Mallinder: England caps could prove crucial to Saints
Saints boss Jim Mallinder says the increasing amount of England caps in his squad could prove crucial in the club's attempt to win the Aviva Premiership.
Mallinder's men fell just short last season, losing at home to Saracens in the Premiership semi-finals.
But with Courtney Lawes forcing himself into the England team alongside team-mates Dylan Hartley, Ben Foden and Chris Ashton, Mallinder feels the growing bank of knowledge and know-how from the highest level of the game will help Saints in their quest for a first Premiership title.
Mallinder said: "Hopefully with the experience that we've had in Europe last season and hopefully the experience our players are picking up in more international games then that will help us through.
"We very narrowly lost to Saracens in the semi-finals.
"There were two or three key decisions and a few by the ref, a few from what we did which ultimately cost us the game, and you saw that again two weeks later with Leicester narrowly beating Saracens in the final.
"You get big games that are very, very tight, but it shows that we're up there.
"And it shows that we can compete, and we can win the big games."
But Mallinder is not going to budge on his policy of playing his best side as much as possible.
The Saints director of rugby kept rotation to a minimum through last season, and feels that is still the best way forward, despite losing their last two home games of the campaign.
"I probably wouldn't agree that we tailed off at the end of last season," said Mallinder.
"We are a good side. I don't think we tailed off against Saracens. We lost a close game against a good side.
"We finished second in the Premiership, we scored a lot of points and I think we had the best defensive record.
"We want to duplicate that, hopefully get better, get into the top four and see if we can go one step further."
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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