Richmond reclaim English title

A decent sized crowd braved the cold evening to see a fired up Richmond pack come storming out of the blocks with excellent set piece work and strong clearing out seeing them win territory deep in Saracens 22 in the opening minutes.

After being awarded three penalties in a row, Richmond showed their intent by shunning the posts and five minutes in, they had the perfect start and got the first points on the board when the pack mauled over the try line for hooker Emma Croker to touch down.

Saracens then found themselves down to 14 players with a yellow card for Karlee Walters as her side battled hard to try and stem the tide up front, and immediately Richmond took their advantage and forced Saracens back over the halfway line. A successful scrum quickly put them back into a position of power and minutes later, captain Jackie Shiels found some space to score in the corner thanks to a neat offload from Oli Davies.

Saracens came back fighting with strrong running from Poppy Cleall and Lottie Clapp, and several minutes later they almost scored through a maul of their own, but some resolute Richmond defence held them up.

Saracens were starting to get a foothold in the game and their pacey back line was starting to look dangerous. They had the opportunity to kick for points when they were awarded the penalty but Lauren Cattell’s kick was wide.

It was then Richmond’s turn for a spot of indiscipline as captain Shiels was send to the sin bin for a deliberate knock on in a tackle. Cattell made the most of the player advantage in the backline and sliced through a gap to grab a try.  She narrowly missed the conversion, with the ball bouncing off the posts to leave her side trailing 10-5 but back in the game.

Richmond's forwards responded by powering their way straight back down the field. After a series of pick and goes, the pack pounded away at the try line and number 8 Anna Caplice squeezed over for the try. Just minutes after the next restart, runs from Ellisha Dee,  Caplice and Vic Cornborough helped to put Richmond back into the Saracens’ half. Winger Holly Myers then came from nowhere, intercepted a pass and scored the fourth try in the first half underneath the posts.  Shiels converted, making the score 22-5 at half time.

Saracens came out strong and determined in the second half, playing their way deep into Richmond territory.

Twenty minutes into the second half, Cattell got her second try of the match, thanks to an excellent pass out wide from fly-half April Brown, leaving herself a tricky conversion and the ball once again bounced off the posts so the score was 22-10

Saracens launched waves of attack and tried to play to their strengths of their speedy wingers but a few too many errors halted any chance of scoring more points.  Abi Chamberlain was next to get on the score sheet after successfully kicking two penalties for Richmond, extending their lead further to 28-10.

Hannah Gallagher had the final say of the game with a consolation try for her team which Cattell successfully converted.