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LEWIS LUDLOW
Gloucester openside
TOM CURRY
Sale openside
When the hard yards needed making Gloucester skipper Ludlow often carried with purpose, although his yellow card put his side on the ropes midway through the second half. There were some stalking, lassoing tackles by Curry, and the England flanker had the presence of mind to hoof the ball off the field with the job done. There was little to separate the two, but Curry just shades it.
THE post-Steve Diamond era at Sale showed a little glimmer as the Sharks nipped to victory with a try less than two minutes from time.
It was the first time they had led all afternoon and ended a three-game losing streak in the Premiership.
And they had the mercilessly sweet boot of fly-half AJ MacGinty to thank, with the American international collecting 17 points in an unerringly accurate display.
With Worcester awarded four points following their cancelled match with Quins, defeat leaves Gloucester at the foot of the table, two points behind Leicester. Gloucester's frustrations boiled over in the final minute when a shoving contest spilled off the pitch and into the front row of the stands, resulting in Billy Twelvetrees being sin-binned.
Sale head coach Paul Deacon said of his stint since Diamond's departure:
“It's nice to get my first win and it's on to next week now.
“We are after consistency and I thought we gave an 80-minute performance. We need to keep that spirit.”
Ten minutes before kick off the first snow of the evening began to tumble, and it was a tepid start to this encounter until Faf de Klerk jolted things into life with a thumping tackle on opposite number Stephen Varney.
Gloucester's warm-up drills had seen them intrude at times into the Sale half, and in the early exchanges the Cherry and Whites continued their territorial intrusions. Lloyd Evans benefited with an early penalty goal.
It might have been more for Gloucester, but strong work by returning Sale captain Jono Ross foiled what looked initially like a promising rumbling drive by the home side.
Ross was one of no fewer than six South Africans in the Sale pack, and strong work by the visiting forwards earned them a penalty which allowed MacGinty to open his account with a simple terpenalty. But Gloucester immediately responded, with Sale's South African contingent unable to stop a 12-man lineout drive which saw Fraser Balmain awarded the try.
MacGinty pulled three points back, but Sale were then left to rue a spell of indiscipline by skipper Ross.
First the flanker was penalised for patronisingly patting Balmain's head after the prop knocked on, and moments later was yellow-carded for a noarms tackle on Val Rapava-Ruskin.
Evans kicked the resulting penalty, and the fly-half then delivered a beautiful delayed pass to the impressive Chris Harris, who in turn fed Louis Rees-Zammit for the try.
While Ross was unreliable, MacGinty was rock-solid for the Sharks. The US Eagles playmaker kicked two more penalties, one each side of half time. Sale brought greater verve to their play in the second period and Tom Roebuck came within a big toe of dotting down in the corner.
But Gloucester desperately hung on, a desperation captured by skipper Lewis Ludlow being sin-binned for not retreating ten.
MacGinty kicked his fifth to reduce Gloucester's lead to just a point, and the home side looked vulnerable. An Evans penalty against the run of play did, however, seem to give the Cherry and Whites a little breathing space.
But Josh Beaumont barrelled over to trash Gloucester's start to 2021 and put Sale back into the playoff zone.
