An experienced Sharks team conceded seven tries against a rampant Gloucester as the Cherry & Whites confirmed their place in the last four of the PREM Rugby Cup.
The home team opened the scoring just inside 10 minutes when former Newcastle full-back Ben Redshaw dived over in the corner. Charlie Atkinson missed the conversion, but he was on target with his next attempt, adding two points to a Seb Blake try under the posts.
On the stroke of half-time, Gloucester extended their lead with their third score. After an error in the back field from Sale the ball was shifted to the left wing and then onto scrum-half Caolan Englefield who put his half-back partner Atkinson over. The fly-half converted his own score to make it 19-0 at half-time.
Gloucester started the second half promisingly, but their momentum was halted when fly-half Atkinson was shown a yellow card for a high tackle.
With the home side down to 14, Sharks got on the scoreboard when Alex Wills took advantage of an overlap to score in the corner. Rob du Preez’s conversion slipped past the upright.
Minutes later, with Altkinson still off the field, Gloucester extended their lead when lock Danny Eite charged down Gus Warr’s box-kick and gathered the ball to score. Englefield’s conversion attempt was wide.
With Atkinson restored at fly-half, Gloucester soon scored again through Will Trenholm and moments later they were gifted a sixth try when Arron Reed fumbled the ball on the ground and Ollie Thorley pounced before feeding Redshaw for his second.
Atkinson converted again to give the hosts a commanding 38-5 lead.
Sale gave themselves a glimmer of hope with ten minutes remaining when Ethan Caine dotted down from short-range but that hope was quickly extinguished when Josh Hathaway gathered his own kick to score.
Winger Wills had the final say of the night, scoring his second on the night for Sale on the stroke of full-time.
Speaking after the game, Sharks coach Joe Ford admitted his side had work to do ahead of the return of the Gallagher Prem in four weeks.
He said: “It’s just not good enough at the moment. The fundamentals of our game are not allowing us to build pressure and we must be brilliant to play against. We’ve got a lot to work on and we’ll have to get it right.
“We spoke about not letting them through the middle and that’s where a couple of tries came from in the first half. There were one on one missed tackles, handling areas, issues with the lineout.
“We’ve just got to get better as an organisation – that’s players and coaches – because there’s still a lot to play for this season. We’ve got an exciting few games coming up leading into the Champions Cup round of 16, which is massively important to us.”
