When he sat down to write the story of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde almost 135 years ago, Robert Louis Stevenson did not have rugby in mind. He would, even so, have appreciated this classic glimpse of Saracens’ current split personality: the indomitable winners who, for now, remain among Europe’s best sides alongside the serial salary cap cheats who have brought their sport into disrepute.
On another day, in other circumstances, this would have been a hard‑earned victory against a top-class side which has secured the club a European quarter-final, albeit away from home at Leinster. Given the truly extraordinary backdrop, with the club’s relegation to the Championship next season now signed and sealed and the abyss beckoning, it was one of the more remarkable displays of backs‑to‑the-wall grit the tournament has ever known.
Because, until a 75th-minute Owen Farrell penalty finally nudged a 14-man Saracens home in an emotion-laden contest, this was threatening to be the day his club’s citadel walls finally came tumbling down. A loss or a draw would have consigned them not so much to disappointment as outer darkness. All their remaining games between now and June would have counted for diddly squat, with relegation guaranteed and the rump of this team resigned to this being their last big game together. Farrell’s three points did not just save the day, it arguably preserved his team-mates’ sanity beneath a flawlessly blue north London sky.
Had the unfortunate Billy Vunipola not sustained a broken forearm and his replacement Will Skelton not been given a red card just before half-time for a reckless high hit, victory might conceivably have achieved more easily. Then again, very little about Saracens’ present predicament is easy, self-inflicted or not. How do you prepare a team for a big game in the knowledge that, win or lose, your world is crumbling?
No wonder their club captain, Brad Barritt, spoke afterwards like a man currently grateful for small mercies. “In many ways it is as good a feeling as it ever has been,” he said. “In the face of adversity, the way guys fought together is a moment we can be very proud of.”
He accepts, however, that his sporting life has been turned on its head. In no particular order the club must now work out which players stay and which will have to go, get their heads around the implications of a new life in the Championship and try and restore, at least from the public’s perspective, what remains of the champions’ integrity. Some creative suggestions have already surfaced – friendly matches against southern hemisphere opposition to keep players interested, for example – but there is no escaping the stark reality of their new diminished status.
“Everyone is gutted; I don’t really need to speak more than that,” Barritt said. “We have spoken at length this week and it is a bitter pill to swallow. People have given their lives to this club, the better part of their careers. Everyone is devastated about it but we weren’t going to let it define us today.”
Barritt also expressed the wish that “the core of this group will stick together” but, in the same sentence, he acknowledged that “things are going to change”. While speculation about leading players going to Lyon has already been rejected by the Top 14 side, no one knows how many will stay.
“It is uncharted territory and if I said now I have the plan, I’d be lying to you,” said Barritt. If, however, Eddie Jones is keen for certain England prospects to be playing regular top‑level club rugby, those individuals may have little choice.
European tournament organisers have already confirmed there are absolutely no circumstances – even if they win this year’s event – under which Saracens can now feature in the Champions Cup as a Championship side. That means they cannot be involved in the elite European competition until the autumn of 2022 at the earliest. Their director of rugby, Mark McCall, said he had “no views” on the idea that Saracens should hand back some of the titles they won during the years they broke the salary cap but did not duck the question of enforced squad alterations.
“There is no doubt the bunch of players we’ve got in our squad now aren’t going to be the same bunch of players that we have in the Championship next year. That is for sure,” he said. “In many ways this is the end of an era, from the start of 2009. We have got some time to plan for a new journey … that is the optimistic way of looking at it.”
For a good number, though, a premature ending looms. At times initially, before the departure of Vunipola and Skelton, who had to go for making heavy contact with Brice Dulin’s head, it was like watching the magnificent Sarries of old. They ended up winning this particular battle but the real war – regaining the wider game’s respect – is only just beginning.
Clermont v Racing 92
Toulouse v Ulster
Exeter v Northampton
Leinster v Saracens
Games to be played 3-5 May, home teams first
