Premiership: Harlequins hold off Northampton Saints fightback at Twickenham Stoop

Harlequins returned to winning ways in the Premiership courtesy of a hard-fought 35-29 victory over Northampton Saints in Sunday’s encounter at Twickenham Stoop.

The home side’s hooker Jack Musk led the way with a brace of tries but despite holding a 28-10 lead early in the second half, Northampton staged a late fightback and came close to clinching victory.

Harlequins‘ other points came via tries from Lennox Anyanwu, Luke Northmore and Cadan Murley while Marcus Smith slotted all five conversions.

For Northampton, Lewis Ludlam, Tommy Freeman, George Furbank and Tom James crossed the whitewash and Dan Biggar succeeded with three conversions and a penalty.

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Northampton made a dreadful start by conceding two converted tries in the opening six minutes.

Their woes started when their scrum retreated rapidly at the first engagement. They were penalised and Smith kicked for the corner before Musk drove over from the resulting line-out.

Careless handling from Saints then saw Joe Marchant pounce on the loose ball and send Anyanwu on a 50-metre run to the line for the second try.

Northampton rallied to dominate the remainder of the first quarter but continued to surrender possession with poor ball-retention.

Tom Collins and Emmanuel Iyogun both fumbled in promising positions so it was left to Biggar to put his side on the scoreboard with a straightforward penalty.

Three minutes later, Quins extended their lead with a superb try. They moved the ball sweetly along their three-quarter line to Northmore, who ran 30 metres to score on his 50th appearance for the club.

Despite trailing 21-3, the visitors had enjoyed more possession and territory and their efforts were finally rewarded when skipper Ludlam crashed over under the posts.

Saints immediately followed this up with the move of the match, which covered over 70 metres and deserved a score, but Rory Hutchinson was forced into touch in the dead-ball area so Quins held a 21-10 lead at the interval.

Three minutes after the restart, Northampton suffered a setback when their Australian lock Lukhan Salakaia-Loto was yellow-carded for a high challenge.

Quins capitalised on his absence by scoring their bonus-point try when Musk finished off a driving line-out.

Saints strike back

Salakaia-Lota returned from the sin-bin in time to see Freeman bring Saints back into contention by scoring their second try.

A comeback looked on the cards but Murley took advantage of some weak defending to squeeze in and put daylight between the teams.

Northampton secured two deserved bonus points late on with converted tries from Furbank and James.

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