Northampton director of rugby Phil Dowson insisted it’s attainable for Saints to problem on two fronts after reaching the quarter-finals of the Investec Champions Cup.
A riveting 24-14 round-of-16 victory over Munster at a blustery Franklin’s Gardens has arrange a last-eight appointment with South African facet the Bulls subsequent weekend.
It took two tries within the remaining quarter from substitute wing George Hendy to interrupt the Irish province, who later revealed they’d been affected by a bug that swept by way of their squad.
Jacques Nienaber on strain and Munster fan reactions
Northampton lead the Gallagher Premiership and will now progress deep into Europe, forcing Dowson to rigorously handle his taking part in sources as they aim the double.
“I believe it’s possible, however we now have to maintain our ft on the bottom,” mentioned Dowson, who was lacking England full-back George Furbank by way of damage.
“One of many issues we’ve been blessed with is the competitors inside the squad. We’ve had a variety of gamers contributing and we left a variety of gamers out this week who had been unfortunate to not be concerned.
“As we choose up bits and items we have to relaxation and rotate. It will get heavy however we’d quite be on this scenario than not.”
Saints got here by way of a full-blooded conflict with Munster, who they toppled within the group stage, by displaying their mettle in a primary half that completed 14-14 after which igniting their assault.
“We’re delighted. It’s the primary time we’ve been within the knockout section of Europe for fairly a while,” Dowson mentioned.
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“We knew the degrees would go up, we knew the menace Munster posed and the way onerous they’d come out of the blocks after what occurred over there. We coped with that and managed to get our sport on to the pitch within the second half.”
England Underneath-20 full-back Hendy was the person of the hour, ending a surprising workforce strive earlier than displaying power to interrupt two tackles and rating within the nook to drive the ultimate nail into Munster’s coffin.
“George had a superb pre-season and began the season rather well. Then he had a irritating damage,” Dowson mentioned.
“The extra he performs, the higher he will get and he had an enormous contribution as we speak. He’s a freak of an athlete.”
Munster captain Tadhg Beirne was amongst these affected by sickness, however the Eire lock refused to make use of it to elucidate the defeat.
“Folks get sick, that’s a part of life. You simply get on with it,” Beirne mentioned.
“That occurs in workforce environments the place we’re scrumming down in opposition to one another and all that type of stuff.
“Lads are going to select up bugs however that’s not the explanation we misplaced. We went on the market, went toe to toe with Saints, they simply received the higher hand. We’ll must take that on the chin.
“It was a battle. You noticed within the first half how tight it was and even within the second half, the sport was on a knife edge for almost all of it.
“We go from having them of their 22 to rapidly they’re scoring. It’s moments like that we’ll look again on and be very pissed off with.
“However I can’t fault the lads’ effort. It was definitely a battle however we got here out on the flawed facet of it.”
