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16 months ago, Northampton’s Chris Boyd suggested that Exeter needed to play more optimistically if they wanted to prosper in Europe, adding that their power play would only get them so far. The Chiefs haven’t forgotten his sour advice, which made this convincing five-shot response even sweeter.
If it wasn’t the runaway victory some were hoping for, Exeter deserved to reach the Champions Cup semi-finals for the first time and there is no doubt that Toulouse will have to dig deeper on Saturday if they want to participate in next month. final. Even when they’re not shooting full blast, Rob Baxter’s team still needs a lot of stops and being 160 minutes away from conquering Europe is all the motivation they’ll need.
With a Premiership semi-final already accumulated, these are increasingly exciting days in the Southwest and the variety of match winners at your disposal is constantly growing. On this occasion, the honors were shared in front of England’s head coach Eddie Jones, who, however, will have been reminded of the dynamic career of Sam Simmonds, the growing authority of the latter’s brother Joe in the middle. elevated and the ability of Henry Slade and Jack Nowell to change a game in the blink of an eye.
Exeter have achieved a club record with seven European matches unbeaten, but at least this was a genuine duel, which was reflected particularly well by visiting rookie mainstay Manny Iyogun, launching into a Champions Cup debut head loose with the hastily registered Alex Sevilla. on emergency loan from Gloucester, as backup. The 19-year-old Iyogun took pride, even helping win a pair of scrum penalties in the fourth quarter, and the specter of unopposed scrums fortunately never materialized.
Exeter could have had a simpler afternoon if their lineout had worked better in the first half, with neither of Luke Cowan-Dickie’s first two pitches hitting their intended target. They were suitably grateful, then, when Cowan-Dickie and his forwards hit a scrum to the head, allowing the graceful Slade to force his way through a series of defenders and put Jack Maunder on alert next to the posts. Simmonds, another Devonian, added the conversion to seal a completely local hit-and-run.
Simmonds has the best kicking ratio in the tournament this season and his 93% pregame ratio was bolstered by a fine angle conversion of winger Jacques Vermeulen’s first try, scored from close range after 25 minutes to extend the lead of the hosts at 14 -3. The Saints, however, were showing a lot of spirit and a touchdown driven from the left for the captain, Teimana Harrison, was no less than they deserved.
The Chiefs, with Ian Whitten making his 50th appearance in Europe, needed to pick up the pace and examine Northampton’s recently fragile confidence. Within two minutes of the restart they had ticked both boxes, the previously silent Nowell edged out some loose tackles to record his team’s third attempt.
Another successful lineout advance produced a fourth, this time for the increasingly prolific Hill, after 54 minutes, only for Fraser Dingwall to cut a clean line upstream to cut the deficit once again.
Ultimately it made little difference, man of the match Vermeulen galloping away for a second attempt three minutes from time to remind Toulouse, despite their offensive verve, that they shouldn’t take on anything in the last four. Exeter have already beaten Castres, Montpellier, Clermont Auvergne and Bordeaux-Bègles on this ground in this tournament and there is yet another gear change left for them.
