Saints not fazed by difficult start to Premiership season

Myler and Co will begin their Premiership campaign by facing Saracens in the first match of the London Double Header at Twickenham on Saturday, September 2.

The first home game will be against local rivals Leicester Tigers on Saturday, September 9, with another Franklin’s Gardens game, against Bath, following six days later.

And though Saints couldn’t have been handed a much tougher first three games, Myler is in bullish mood.

“We’re very excited,” the fly-half said.

“It’s obviously a huge start for us and I’m sure at that point we’ll be ready to get our season underway because we’ll be sick of pre-season training.

“It’s a huge occasion, the Double Header at Twickenham, and it’s a team we know very well in Sarries.

“We know it’s going to be a tough task, but we’re looking forward to the pre-season block we’ve got coming up and hopefully we’ll be ready to go.”

Saints’ international stars are not yet back in training as they have to have a five-week rest period.

But the other members of the squad have returned to the paddock at the Gardens and the fixtures announcement has provided a focus ahead of the start of pre-season action on August 12.

“It definitely now seems a little bit more real,” Myler said.

“Not all of our lads are back in training yet, but the majority are and now it gives us the focus point of how we’re going to start our season.

“We’ve not necessarily sat down and written down goals yet because not everyone is back, but what is key is that we get off to a good start.

“It’s going to be tough because it’s two good teams we face in the first two weeks, but it’s two teams we feel we can be more than competitive against.

“We know a lot about them from recent seasons so we’ve got a lot of hard work to do in the mean time and we’re really excited about what’s to come.”