Leicester turn up the hostility as Steward caps old-time beating of Northampton

We have seen this before. It is easy to forget, amid all the tries and sunshine, that rugby has a darker side too – a wet, windy, deafening ferocity that not even the most twinkle-toed can transcend. And they practically invented it at Welford Road.

This is not the first time Leicester have welcomed their beloved neighbours to the lair as champions and disabused them of any notions of grandeur. It took the Tigers a full 40 minutes to whip themselves into the necessary fervour, but when they did, all else followed: the rocking stadium at capacity, the win, the bonus point, the obliterated opposition.

It was not just the 40 minutes of directionless fumbling by the home team but a mass fracas with a host of those visiting friends, which spilled into the stand, that sparked them into life. The second-half Tigers showed the first-half version how a lineout and drive is executed, when Jamie Blamire scored their first try within four minutes of the restart. That earned them a one-point lead, and normal service was resumed.

Half-time’s highlights analysis probably centred on the bust-up which continued long after the referee had brought the first half to a close. On it went, up the famous steps of the Crumbie Stand, where Henry Pollock, obviously, seemed more interested in tying his shoelace than getting in for an orange. Ollie Chessum and Freddie Steward, his England teammates, did not find it funny, shoving him all the way to the away changing room.

Such discord was in keeping with a first half in which neither side could quite find their feet on the slippery turf. Saints seemed more in tune with the kind of rugby that has prevailed before the rains came. Theirs was the only try of the first half, early on, when Finn Smith, with an advantage, chipped in behind, where Billy Searle spilled, and James Pater gathered to score.

Leicester could not make anything of a stream of penalties in the first half, sending four of them to the corner in the first quarter alone and spilling or, often, not even securing the subsequent possession. How that was going to change.

Once Blamire’s try had restored order, the Tigers tore through the Saints at set piece and high ball. The champions deteriorated in the swirling rain.

Cameron Henderson was next to rise to take a lineout, after a ferocious scrum had earned the penalty. Henderson then finished in the corner like a winger, sent away by Gabriel Hamer-Webb. That put Leicester six ahead, but five minutes later they were more than a score clear, this time Finn Carnduff finishing after another attacking lineout.

The bonus point came in the final 10 minutes after one of the more bizarre swings of fortune. Smith’s cross-kick had sent George Hendy away from his own 22, Adam Radwan’s slap-down earned him a yellow card. But way back earlier in the move Tom Lockett’s head had collided with Solomone Kata’s. It was another totally innocent accident, Kata not only changing direction but rising sharply to clash with the covering Lockett. Even by rugby’s standards, the yellow card was absurd punishment. But it also meant that Radwan’s was rescinded. On he came, off Lockett went, and over strolled Freddie Steward for the bonus point from the subsequent lineout.

When it is not your day, it is not your day. But when it is your day, especially at this grand stadium on a wet and windy afternoon, it really is.