Huddersfield's Luther Burrell aims to continue a stellar season by helping Northampton upset the odds with an Aviva Premiership final victory over Saracens at Twickenham on Saturday.
The 26-year-old England centre has already collected one winners’ medal after Northampton’s Amlin European Challenge Cup final triumph over Bath at Cardiff Arms Park a week ago.
Now Saints aim to maintain their momentum against a Sarries side beaten by Toulon in the Heineken Cup final last Saturday.
The Londoners finished nine points clear of Northampton at the top of the Premiership and were 31-17 play-off semi-final winners over Harlequins.
Saints, with former All Saints High School and Huddersfield New College student Burrell busy in the threequarters, beat big rivals Leicester 21-20 with a last-gasp try by England flanker Tom Wood.
Now they aim for a fourth successive victory, and a first Premiership title.
For former Huddersfield RU junior player Burrell, in his second season at Saints after playing for Leeds and Sale, it’s a welcome return to Twickenham, where he made his third England appearance.
That was in the 29-18 Six Nations win over Wales, and followed his tryscoring debut in the 26-24 defeat by France in Paris and his second outing in the 20-0 win over Scotland at Murrayfield, where he claimed another touchdown.
There was another try against Wales to go with five in 27 games for his club this season.
The powerful back, who is 6ft 3in tall and weighs in at 17st, could yet be added to the England touring party for the summer trip to New Zealand.
But for the moment, his focus is on the big final, with Saints coach Jim Mallinder saying he has taken pointers from Toulon’s 23-6 win over Sarries.
“Sarries are very, very good and even harder to beat once they get ahead,” he said.
“Clermont (defeated in the Heineken Cup semis) showed that when you go a few points behind and start to overplay against them you play into their hands.
“We want to start well. We don’t go out with the intention of not starting well, but what we have shown is that with our belief and fitness levels and strength in the squad, we can play for the full 80 minutes.
“We’ve done that in the past few games now. You look at the 23 in our squad and we are strong.
“We could name a number of players who could start easily and some of those players will be coming off the bench and hopefully bringing us home.”
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