Gloucester's revival continues with statement win over Saracens

Saracens 24 Gloucester 25

What a landmark win this was for Gloucester, a statement that the club are truly back and with a pack to fear too. Not only did they end Saracens' unbeaten run at home in the Gallagher Premiership this season, this was also Gloucester's first away win over Saracens going back to the days at Vicarage Road in 2008. George Skivington when he arrived last year aimed to restore Gloucester's forwards into a nasty bunch who could grind out results just like this one. The process is working.

Putting away Saracens without their top two loosehead props sidelined was hugely impressive by Gloucester, and it would hardly be shocking if their captain Lewis Ludlow, who produced the game-clinching turnover at the death, and his back-row colleague Ruan Ackermann at No 8 end up in the England squad in a few weeks' time.

"Players like achieving milestones and not many teams come here and win. It’s a proud day for the players, the club, the supporters and we want to build on that going into the second half of the season," said Gloucester attack coach Alex King. "We’ve had a good first half of the season, today was a really good test of where we are and I’m just immensely proud of the effort from minute one to minute 80."

Saracens still might have kept their home record intact had Alex Lozowski's touchline conversion of Alex Lewington's late try not faded past the right post, after Gloucester had taken the lead late on through a maul try scored by Jack Clement and an Adam Hastings penalty. But regardless a "massively disappointed" Mark McCall, the Saracens director of rugby, might have still been unimpressed with his side's output.

"Huge credit to Gloucester for how they played, I thought they were tremendous. You can see a club that's growing, great spirit, togetherness that they demonstrated the whole way through the game," McCall said. "We were just a bit off today, we didn't have the energy that we normally have, especially in the first half. We got a little bit out-enthused by them - that's not something I'm happy to say when we're at home."

Having scored a maul try in every Premiership game this season, unsurprisingly Gloucester fired it up for yet another set-piece try, finished off by Fraser Balmain to open the scoring.

A yellow card against Gloucester's Santiago Carreras for a deliberate knock-on opened the door for Saracens to take the lead, kicking to the corner looking for a maul score of their own. Gloucester stopped it, but illegally, with Ludlow joining Carreras in the bin for sacking the maul. But Saracens still found a way over, an enjoyable dummy from Dom Morris freezing the entire Gloucester backline before he powered through a tackle to score.

Saracens then further exploited their two-player advantage, sucking Gloucester defenders into the maul before Rotimi Segun delivered a rapid burst back on the angle from first receiver to catch Gloucester out and score.

Gloucester to their credit hit back immediately, Carreras doing well in the air from the restart to win back the ball, with Jordy Reid racing clear up the touchline. Reid was tackled short, but offloaded well for Jack Singleton to score against his old side, making it 14-12 at half-time.

Gloucester went in front through a Hastings penalty after Ackermann was tackled off the ball. They were ahead for barely a minute. Saracens are high on the potential of Theo McFarland, the former basketball player, and it was the 6ft 6in forward with his first involvement off the bench who charged down Charlie Chapman before regathering to score, putting Saracens back in front despite being down to 14 following Mako Vunipola's yellow card.

After plenty of territory but no points, a high tackle by Saracens handed Gloucester the maul opportunity they had been waiting for, Clement finishing it off to put Gloucester ahead again with seven minutes left, followed by Hastings' conversion and then a penalty, won at the breakdown by Chris Harris, to leave Saracens in need of a converted try.

Boy did they get one, Lewington off the bench for Elliot Daly bursting through on the angle and outpacing the defence to finish in the corner. That left Lozowski with a tricky touchline conversion, which missed to the right.

Gloucester needed one last defensive stand and Ludlow delivered. They missed out on a win over a top-four rival last week at home to Harlequins, but not this time. Their revival appears complete.

Match details

Scoring sequence: 0-5 Balmain try, 5-5 Morris try, 7-5 Lozowski con, 12-5 Segun try, 14-5 Lozowski con, 14-10 Singleton try, 14-12 Hastings con, 14-15 Hastings pen, 19-15 McFarland try, 19-20 Clement try, 19-22 Hastings con, 19-25 Hastings pen, 24-25 Lewington try

Saracens: M Malins; R Segun, A Lozowski, D Morris (N Tompkins 61), E Daly (A Lewington 64); A Goode, I van Zyl (R de Haas 69); M Vunipola (E Mawi 73), J George (c, T Woolstencroft 64), V Koch, M Itoje, T Swinson (T McFarland 52), N Isiekwe (C Hunter-Hill 73), B Earl, A Christie

Not used: G Milasinovich

Yellow card: M Vunipola 36

Gloucester: L Evans; S Carreras (L Rees-Zammit 66), C Harris, M Atkinson, J May (B Twelvetrees 70); A Hastings, C Chapman (B Meehan 65); A Seville (C Knight 73), J Singleton (S Socino 65), F Balmain (K Gotovtsev 60), F Clarke, M Alemanno (E Slater 53), J Reid (J Clement 73), L Ludlow (c), R Ackermann

Yellow cards: S Carreras 19, L Ludlow 20

Referee: K Dickson

Attendance: 7,500