Sale Sharks racked up nine tries against Newcastle Red Bulls to come out on top of a one-sided northern derby under the Friday night lights at the CorpAcq Stadium.
Sharks and England winger Tom Roebuck scored a hat trick while fellow wideman Arron Reed bagged a brace to secure Alex Sanderson’s men a 57-5 win and five valuable points.
Sale flew out of the blocks and their early dominance was rewarded with the first try after just seven minutes. Sharks outside centre Rob du Preez touched down in the right corner after the forwards did the hard work. The imperious George Ford converted to push the lead to seven points.
Just four minutes later, seven would become 14 as some slick handling saw Reed switch wings and feed Roebuck who accelerated through a hole in the defence to dive under the posts.
The lead was extended again before the game was even 15 minutes old. Red Bulls centre Max Clark was sent to the sin bin for an offence under his own posts and from the resulting penalty, Sharks returning Lions hooker Luke Cowan-Dickie powered his way over. Ford converted again to make the score 21-0.
With 14 men, Red Bulls rallied and managed to exert some pressure on the home side.
But with half an hour gone, the bonus point was wrapped up when Sharks skipper Ernst van Rhyn marked his 50th appearance by diving over from a maul after a penalty was kicked to the corner. Ford missed the conversion but the score read 26-0.
Soon after it was Sharks’ turn to earn a yellow as Cowan-Dickie was sent to the sin-bin for a cynical offence in the Sale half.
But the numerical advantage didn’t hamper the home side as a kick through from Rob du Preez sent Reed into the corner for the first of his two tries.
Ford was off target with the extras to send Sale into the half time break with a 31-0 lead.
The second half began in similar fashion with a Bevan Rodd break almost leading to a sixth Sharks score. But with 48 mins on the clock, the Red Bulls got on the scoresheet.
A Reed knock on led to a pen and a kick to the corner and from the resulting lineout, the ball was shifted from the right to the left for Elliott Obatoyinbo to break three tackles and touch down.
That proved to be only temporary respite for Newcastle, who conceded again on 54 minutes. This time it was Marius Louw feeding Roebuck to cross in the right corner for his second try. Another Ford conversion pushed the lead to 38-5.
And 38-5 became 45-5 when Jibulu took the ball from a lineout and brushed off two tackles to touch down.
Minutes later Reed crossed for his second after a Jibulu offload and the scoring was complete when Roebuck scored his third as the clock ticked over to 80 minutes.
Ford missed the conversion but it didn’t matter.
Sale: Carpenter; Roebuck, R. du Preez, Louw, Reed; Ford, Warr; Rodd, Cowan-Dickie, Opoku-Fordjour, Bamber, Andrews, van Rhyn, Woodman, Dugdale.
Replacements: Jibulu, McIntyre, Harper, Burrow, Caine, Quirke, O’Flaherty, Bedlow.
Newcastle: Grayson; Obatoyinbo, Doherty, Clark, Hearle; Chamberlain, Elliott; Brocklebank, McGuigan, Palframan, Hodgson, Clarke, Lee-Warner, Gordon, Mafi.
Replacements: Fletcher, Rewcastle, McCallum, Usher, Neild, Cruz, Connon, Spencer.
Referee: Joe James
