Rock bottom

Defeat to Worcester was terrible, one of the lowest points at this club in the last few years.

It was a huge downer and I don't think I've ever seen Philippe (Saint-Andre) like he was in training on Monday.

The players were all locked in a room and forced to watch the game again. We did our own debriefing, discussed what we thought went wrong, and then the coaches had their say.

We got a complete rollicking and, as I said, that's not usually Philippe's style but it probably did us good.

I've never seen the lads as fired up as they were in training this week - we definitely feel we have a major point to prove.

It shouldn't really take a defeat like that to get that reaction but the main thing is that everyone is responding in the right way.

We're quietly confident we can go to Northampton and win but it'll be far from easy.

Like us, they've suffered badly with injuries this season and I'm sure they'd relish the chance to dump us into further trouble.

We need to go back to basics to start winning again, sort out the parts of our game that are not functioning.

It starts up front. We need to address our set piece and start dominanting games again because the last two games we've been bullied by powerful teams.

The forwards set the platform for the backs, so if we sort that out, the rest of it will soon come into place.

As far as the backs go, we need to start finishing our chances, to play with confidence and with our heads up.

Our attitude has been all wrong recently so if we go into Saturday's game with a different mentality we will give ourselves a much better chance.

A lot of the guys at the club now are finding this strange because they don't know what it's like to be involved in a relegation scrap, especially with Sale.

But I've been through all this before with the club, although it is weird because i didn't expect to be back in this position so soon.

It's disappointing but it's a major test of our character and I do believe that if we come through this, we will be much stronger for it next season.

The youngers lads especially will benefit from it. They've been given chances they might not have been given under different circumstances and it's been really tough for them.

But when they finally make the breakthrough to the first team on a regular basis they'll be ready for it.

We have some really talented young lads in our squad and the future really does look bright.

Our chances of winning on Saturday haven't been helped by (England head coach) Brian Ashton calling up Quates (Mark Cueto) though.

He'll be a big loss but I'm delighted he's back in the England set-up, he's been determined to force his way back in since coming back from injury, in whatever position!

I do find it slightly strange though that Ashton sees him as a full back and Robbo (Jason Robinson) as a winger. Robbo is top class on the wing but I think he's England's best option at full back.

That said, I'm sure Quates will do a good job. He hits the line well, is quick and has the fitness to play on the counter-attack.

Who knows? We might see him play full back regularly for Sale sometime in the future.

The Six Nations has been pretty open this year and it's thrown up some real surprises. When Italy lost their first game to France it looked like it was going to be another hard year for them, but look what's happened since.

France lost at Twickenham and England pulled out a superb performance from somewhere, while the Irish struggled against Scotland.

Whatever happens, I reckon we'll be in for an interesting day on Saturday.