Onyeama-Christie’s double gives Saracens opening win at Gloucester | Premiership

No Owen Farrell, no problem. Saracens will face considerably tougher tests as the season progresses, but life without the former England captain has started off just about ideally.

After 16 years as a key cog in the team, it’s inevitable that Farrell’s influence will be missed this season – they could have done with his trusty right foot here, perhaps his ruthless professionalism at the end – but five tries and an impressive performance from Elliot Daly help Mark McCall usher in the new era he is determined to create.

The same cannot be said of Gloucester, who finished second last season and did little to suggest they will not have another campaign of upheaval. They proved far too accommodating for their new opponents, who scored tries from Rotimi Segun, Ivan van Zyl, Tobias Elliott and two from Andy Onyeama-Christie. A brief revival with the game already taken from them added a modicum of respectability, but little more.

That both Vunipolas were gone and that McCall opted to start with Jamie George and Ben Earl on the bench only added to the sense of something different in the Saracens ranks, but in Daly they had the star performer, who set up two tries and worked well with Fergus Burke, the 25-year-old Kiwi making his debut at fly-half.

Maro Itoje, another England stalwart who has taken over the captaincy, has also performed well, while McCall is particularly excited about the development of Onyeama-Christie. On this evidence, it is not hard to see why.

For Gloucester, much of the optimism for the season has evaporated. They too have had a summer makeover and if Saracens’ is more pronounced because of the personnel they have lost, the sheer number of international matches, Gloucester have a new all-Welsh halfback partnership in Tomos Williams and Gareth Anscombe and an intention to play on the front foot.

Christian Wade is also among them, someone who will always bring a spark of excitement when he gets near the ball. Afolabi Fasogbon, the England Under-20 World Cup-winning regular, also made his first competitive start. Expectations are high given England’s lack of depth in his position.

As a result, they started hastily – forcing Burke into a slick pass early on – but quickly ran out of ideas. Saracens are nothing if not dogged in defence and in the first 15 minutes they took the sting out of the hosts, scrambling when necessary or holding their ground on the gain line with Itoje unleashing a fearsome shot. The visitors had threatened a minute before his opener through Segun, his grubber too heavy, but when Daly went to the boot his strike was perfectly timed for his winger to collect and score.

Try No 2 came when Van Zyl intercepted Anscombe far too easily and had enough pace to get to the line before Elliott added a third with Daly again the provider. It was hard to find a way back for Gloucester but Burke’s two missed conversions gave them a glimmer of hope and after a break away from the Saracens line on the stroke of half-time, Freddie Thomas squeezed over to put the Cherry & Whites on the scoreboard.

Their hopes did not last long. Saracens’ failure to collect their second-half kick-off proved costly – George Skivington will be furious – and soon Onyeama-Christie was diving over the back of a driving lineout.

A penalty from Burke spoiled the fun and extended Saracens’ lead to 20 points. Although Freddie Clarke crossed the line on the left for Gloucester shortly after coming on, Onyweama-Christie scored his second after a clever line-out from George, straight to van Zyl.

Burke continued to polish his goal kicking with another three points before a late Gloucester rally produced tries from Jack Clement and Seb Blake. You suspect that if Farrell had played, Gloucester would have found those last two scores harder to come by.