Northampton Saints: Hartley happy to give two fingers to critics

May 03, 2011

SKIPPER Dylan Hartley says Saints gave their critics ‘two fingers’ by powering into the Heineken Cup final.

Hartley was at the centre of a superb front row display that saw them win the forward power battle against Perpignan’s mighty pack.

The big French side were sent packing by a Saints scrum that wore them down to set up a 23-7 win and the club’s first Heineken Cup final since lifting the trophy with victory over Munster in 2000.

And Saints will take on Irish opposition again in Cardiff on May 21 when they meet Leinster at the Millennium Stadium.

Hartley said: “We go into that game as underdogs, I have already been told that so that is good for us.

“We have been under the radar even going into this semi-final.

“I have read a bit of press and watched The Rugby Club and people are still picking at things about us.

“That is quite nice, if anything we go out there and play for ourselves and for the team.

“It is quite nice to be able to stick two fingers up to the doubters and reach a big final.

“We have worked hard together and we are in a cup final and it is all to play for.”

Hartley was delighted with his pack’s effort against a Perpignan whose lineout drive turned out to be their only weapon.

“We spoke about it in the week, about gaining parity up front, but today we got a bit of dominance,” said Hartley.

“We secured about six points from the scrum today.

“It doesn’t come just like that, it takes 40 minutes of tiring them out and 20 minutes into the second half that is when we started getting our gains.

“We have got an ‘every time’ mentality and we got that today.”

Saints might be underdogs to beat Leinster, who will be in their second final in three years after beating Leicester in 2009, but Hartley is looking forward to it.

“It is a one off game,” said Hartley.

“It is quite nice going in as underdogs. This team can beat anybody on its day, if you turn up and start a game well anything can happen.

“I am fairly confident we have got a group here and we have been building to something like this.

“It is nice we have gone one step further this year in making a big final.”