Richard Mayhew is refusing to get too carried away despite helping Newcastle Falcons announce themselves back to English rugby’s top table in style as they stormed into the J.P. Morgan Asset Management Premiership Rugby 7s Series Final.
The Newcastle Falcons have previous in the J.P. Morgan Premiership Rugby 7s, having won the title in 2011 by beating Saracens in the final.
However they were unable to defend their crown last year after the club suffered relegation to the Championship.
But the Falcons are soaring high again and after booking a spot at the Rec for the August 9 Series Finals they look like a side determined to get their hands back on the silverware that was so cruelly taken away from them.
Captain Mayhew guided them through the first obstacle at Franklin’s Gardens but he is not about to let his team-mates get ahead of themselves before they have even stepped foot in Bath.
“We are delighted,” he said. “We came into this competition with some young guys who wanted to show what they have got and have a crack and the results took care of themselves.
“We have been working really hard on our strength and conditioning in pre-season and a lot of the XVs work transfers over into the 7s but it was the hard work we have done before that has helped.
“There were a few scratchy plays but our emphasis and philosophy is based on hard work and guys grafting for each other and when you do that in 7s you can get a good result.
“We are delighted with the start but there are more games to go so we will be looking forward to that next week. Anything is possible but we just need to take care of our first game and take it from there.”
Following Newcastle to Bath are Leicester Tigers after they got the better of hosts Northampton Saints in the night’s final game – reminiscent of last season’s Aviva Premiership Final with the victor guaranteed a Final spot.
And coach Geordan Murphy admitted it was nice to buck the trend with Tigers finally transferring their XV form – that saw them become English champions for a tenth time last campaign – over into the 7s arena.
“I’m really over the moon. We have lost ten on the trot in this competition so we were kicking ourselves a little bit,” said Murphy.
“It’s a strange one – we have put so much emphasis on our XVs that we haven’t spent a lot of time on 7s, but I knew with the guys we picked that we had a good chance of getting some wins.
“There was some great sides here and some guys who were very well drilled but all in all to was great to see the guys come down here and work very hard for each other.
For tickets to the J.P. Morgan Premiership Rugby Series Final at 7pm on Friday, 9 August at The Rec, Bath visit: bathrugby.com/tickets
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