AP Cup – an old grey dog

It’s always good to beat Leicester and the Sale Sharks women did so in some style to kick off a new season. Despite a shaky first ten minutes, which saw Leicester take a 7-0 lead, Sale found their composure, drew level within a couple of minutes, and never looked back.

It’s hard to draw conclusions from a single game but I think I see a bit more composure – a year-on-year overall improvement in the play as they get more experience and become more comfortable with each other.

I’m still working on recognising everyone – a task not helped by several new faces this season – so I’m going to miss out on mentioning players who should be mentioned. Apologies: I’ll get there eventually…

With an expression that suggests she’s not so much chewed a wasp as fricasseed it in hot sauce, ~~tall Vicky~~ Big Vick continues to stand out in more ways than one. Seemingly at the centre of everything, she played a significant part in Niamh Swailes’ try as well as bludgeoning through the entire Leicester defence to score a try of her own.

Talking of Niamh Swailes, she showed a decent turn of speed to score Sale’s second try. An outside centre would have been proud of that.

Usual suspects: Katana Howard, Hollie Bawden; Lizzie Duffy showed some good pace on the counter-attack to feed Hollie Thorpe for her try.

Onward and upward. Meanwhile, have some pictures.