mens
Gallagher-Prime Minister
Alex Coles will become the fourth player in the current squad to reach 150 caps Northampton Saints when they take to Mattioli Woods Welford Road on Saturday.
Eight years after his debut, the 27-year-old England lock joins Fraser Dingwall, Rory Hutchinson and Alex Mitchell in reaching the milestone.
Coles marks one of nine changes to the Saints side for the Derby Day clash against Leicester, with Emmanuel Iyogun, Curtis Langdon, Ed Prowse, Tom Pearson – making his first league appearance of the season – and Henry Pollock other names coming into the forwards.
Three more changes come for the Saints in the backs, starting with Fin Smith, PREM’s leading points scorer. He joins British and Irish Lion Alex Mitchell – who scored one of Saints’ 11 tries in their last PREM outing against Bath – in the half-backs. Behind Mitchell and Smith, Fraser Dingwall returns to the starting XV as Northampton captain.
The Saints are winless Leicester from January 2023, when one point decided the result 18-19. Since then, the last five head-to-head meetings have been won by the hosts on the day – with Saints last claiming bragging rights when Tom Litchfield’s hat-trick helped Northampton to a 45-31 home win in last season’s PREM play-offs.
Northampton v Leicester squad:
15 James Pater
14 Tommy Freeman
13 Rory Hutchinson
12 Fraser Dingwall (c)
11 George Hendy
10 Finn Smith
9 Alex Mitchell
1 Emmanuel Iyogun
2 Curtis Langdon
3 Cleopas To see me
4 Alex Coles – 150th Saints appearance
5 Ed Prowse
6 Josh Kemeny
7 Tom Pearson
8 Henry Pollock
Replacements:
16 Robbie Smith
17 Danilo Fischetti
18 Ion Neculai
19 JJ Van Der Mescht
20 Tom Lockett
21 Callum Chick
22 Archie McParland
23 Ollie Sleightholme
