Only managed to watch the game last night after a busy weekend. Brilliant win, I like Saints but I do like winning away at theirs!
I think everyone has covered most of the points: team played well, good individual performances, nice to see the youngsters showing what they can do. I've got a few things I noticed though.
When the teams came out, I was expecting us to be battered. That was a pretty strong Saints team and isn't far off the team that will play their first few Prem games.
The Ref - Refs have had a bit of stick over the world cup and on several platforms I've seen criticism of them for both our games so far. That's fine, not problem pointing out mistakes etc but I think we should remember that these guys are new and are learning, new referees have to start out somewhere and they are going to make a few mistakes etc. I thought that on the whole he managed the game on Saturday well and helped make it an entertaining spectacle, got the big calls right and will improve with time.
Defence - I know it's difficult to ship that many tries and say D was good but it was better. For the headed assist , our scramble defence had done a good job and if the pass had been a fraction lower it would have come off Grayson's shoulder and been turned over. Eadie's intercept was 80% great play from him 20% bad play from us but not a defensive error and their two last tries were down to a rampaging Naiyaravoro. We forced a lot of errors and out defence of our line at the end was very good. I agree with WickedWasp that we struggle when teams go wide quickly (though that may have been Spink's inexperience in rushing up at 13)
Discipline - 12 pens, 8 in open play (I think). Spread around - offside, hands in the ruck, couple of not releasing. Not bad, certainly better. Valianu setting off without support has been mentioned.
Set Piece - Not as good as last week but I imagine it was low down the list for training and Alo is not as good a scrumager as Brookes. Their line out also had four genuine jumpers and that may have meant we went for a more conservative approach to secure ball which made the maul less effective. Not bad though and I think with Brookes back it will be a good weapon for us.
Like others, I was impressed with Sam Wolstenholme, quick thinking, good rugby brain, fast hands and good crisp passes but there were a couple of problems (understandable he's 20 and 4th choice), box kick was awful (led to two tries and we never got close to completing with any of them bar one) and defence was iffy. He'll get better though and I'm less worried about 9 now.
Jacob is really growing into the first team. He was standing flat, taking the ball to the line and his passing was good, one try, one assist and a key role in two more. Love his attacking intent and quick thinking. Shame his kicking was so off but I was encouraged. I really hope he stays and establishes himself.
Sam Spink had a decent game. Couple of very good runs - he seems to favour a power run rather than an arc - and tackled well. He did go missing a bit though. I'd like him to come looking a little bit more and try to make himself available as a support runner as I think his hard running would be great off an offload.
After an awful week for Wasps last week, this had been very welcome.
Always a Wasp