English Rugby / Geoffrey Riddle / 01 September 2008 / Leave a comment

Geoffrey Riddle looks at the Guinness Premiership relegation market on Betfair and tells us why departed players and England players make Newcastle worthy favourites to finish rock bottom

Newcastle [3.25]

It is easy to see why Newcastle are favourites to finish rock bottom. They lack any sort of firepower. The Falcons scored only one try-scoring bonus point last season. To make matters worse for coach Steve Bates, his two most creative players, England internationals Matthew Tait and Toby Flood, have moved on to pastures new. Former Australian international Matt Burke has retired.

It gets worse. Although long-standing Gloucester servant Adam Balding has moved up to Newcastle to play in the back-row, it is only as a replacement, as along with the talent drain in the backs, flanker Ben Woods has decided to move to Leicester with Flood.

It is a worrying situation for Bates, who also needs to arrest the disgraceful form of his squad away from Kingston Park. In the past two seasons, Newcastle have won just two games on the road in the Premiership. Two years ago they beat Sale 26-18 in the November international window, while last season Tait and Flood crossed the whitewash against Saracens, who had rested both Richard Hill and Andy Farrell, to help record a sensational away success. It must be mentioned here that Flood's try was scored when Sarries were down to 14 men.

With Danny Cipriani still injured, Jonny Wilkinson is a shoo-in to play for England during the autumn internationals and perhaps even a few games of the Six Nations. Centre Jamie Noon may also feature in those matches. Without those two, a heavy reliance falls on Tom May, who top-scored for the club last season with seven tries. An over-reliance on a chosen few is not enough in the Premiership these days, especially when your star players are England internationals. The Falcons look value to finally be brought back down to earth at [3.25] on Betfair. Paddy Power are as short as 13-8.

Bristol [4.5]

Many are expecting a tough season for Bristol. Critics have looked at the list of those departed and have summarised that the club's warrior spirit has finally ebbed away. Dependable war-horses Gareth Llewellyn and Dave Hilton have retired, and the likes of Sam Cox, Sean Hohneck, Rob Higgitt and David Hill have all left, making coach Richard Hill's changing room look a little threadbare.

The former England scrum-half has, however, signed Wales's Grand Slam-winning lock Robert Sidoli and the former Harlequins' fly-half Adrian Jarvis. There are also a host of National League One players who come in, the most exciting of which is Tongan international Vunga Lilo. Lilo transferred over from Cornish Pirates where he scored seven tries from just 13 starts.
It is fair to say that the Heineken Cup was an unwelcome distraction for the West Country club last season, who it must be remembered finished third two seasons ago, and they never strung more than a three-match winning sequence together for the entire campaign.

The squad's main problem was that they could never score enough points from match to match, scoring the third-fewest tries ahead of Newcastle and Leeds with 40. David Lemi and Luke Arscott, their two most prolific tryscorers remain, and with Lilo now in tow, they should improve on that tally.

Landlords Bristol Rovers have delayed the scheduled revamp of the Memorial Stadium for another season, giving the players the freedom to operate without a proposed move to Wales that dogged the squad last season. With no European distractions this time around, Bristol should be focused enough to hold onto their Premiership status once again.

Northampton [5.0]

Northampton are one of the great rugby clubs in England, and much-chastened after their experience in National Division One, they head into the new season full of confidence.
Coach Jim Mallinder has had a quick clean-out, getting rid of 12 players that served him well in the lower league.

In the other direction though, Mallinder has made some eye-catching signings. He raided his former club Sale and came back with the signatures of Chris Mayor, Ignacio Fernandez-Lobbe, and the brilliant Ben Foden, who, despite playing in a multitude of positions last season, crossed the whitewash eight times in just 14 league starts.

Others who are worth a mention are Ulster back-row duo Roger Wilson and the spiky flanker Neil Best.

There have been some encouraging results from their pre-season efforts, too. The Saints beat a touring Western Force side 22-3 on August 23rd. The result against the Super 14 franchise not only showcased the power of the Northampton scrum, but also highlighted the skills of league convert Chris Ashton, who scored two tries. The victory also illustrated how well the Saints squad could operate under the new ELVs, particularly as The Force had played under the laws during the Super 14 this season.

It is not all good news at the re-vamped Franklin's Gardens, however. Nick Johnson, the club's head of conditioning issued a warning about the levels of fitness of his newly-promoted charges: "We are off the pace," he said bluntly. "I'd say we're two years off the top four or six in the league in terms of fitness levels," he continued.

A sobering thought for those expecting Northampton to easily avoid the drop this time, which, realistically, they should do.

Worcester [5.1]

If Worcester were to translate the form that they showed in the second-half of last season to this campaign, they would be pushing Wasps as the best team in the section.
The Warriors only lost twice in their last eight games, and one of those was a 23-20 defeat to in-form Bath at Sixways. Compare that to the first-half of Worcester's season, when they went without a win in their first ten matches. To be fair, it wasn't all doom and gloom at that time for coach Mike Ruddock as Worcester picked up six losing bonus-points. It just showed that Ruddock was right to pursue the sort of game-plan that made him a Grand Slam winner when in charge of Wales in 2005.

Despite a squad that boasts such backs as former All Black Rico Gear and the fleet-footed wingers Miles Benjamin and Marcel Garvey, Worcester picked up only one try-scoring bonus-point in the league all season. Ruddock has tried to amend that by bringing in Hal Luscombe from Harlequins and the rugged Aussie full-back Chris Latham. The departures of Shane Drahm, James Brown and Thinus Delport will not have helped matters, however.

Worcester showed enough determination last season to prove that they have what it takes to survive another grim fight at the bottom of the table. If they can summon up the panache that Garvey, Benjamin and Gear provided in the second half of last season, who knows, maybe mid-table respectability could be in the offering?