Leicester vs Northampton: Geordan Murphy admits Tigers are ‘in the mire’ of a Premiership relegation fight

Leicester Tigers 29-15 Northampton Saints: The East Midlands derby defeat leaves Murphy’s side down in 10th place and nervously looking over their shoulder with just five matches remaining

Leicester Tigers find themselves nine points above relegation after a 29-15 defeat by Northampton Saints (Getty)

Geordan Murphy accepted Leicester Tigers face a huge battle to avoid Gallagher Premiership relegation after his team were beaten 29-15 by Northampton Saints at Welford Road.

The visitors were clinical when it mattered most as they scored three first-half tries through Cobus Reinach and a Tom Collins brace.

Leicester had Mike Williams and Dan Cole yellow-carded in either period in a poor team display. Dan Biggar kicked 14 points for Saints while home tries came from George Ford, who also kicked a conversion and a penalty, and Tom Youngs.

"We need to drive forward and get more out of ourselves, me included," said Leicester head coach Murphy. "We want to be competing at the top end of the league, but we are right down at the bottom and in the mire.

"It's going to be tight. We have struggled with our confidence all season.

"We had some chances in the first half, but we bombed them. Saints did a very good job of slowing our ball down and I thought Heinrich Brussow and Teimana Harrison were excellent at that. It bordered right on the edge of legality, but they got away with it.

"It was a very strange game. We actually started well but then we got a yellow card, Saints raised the tempo and scored three quick tries, and we were chasing the game. We knew it was going to be a mountain to climb at half-time."

Leicester had plenty of first-half possession, but did little with it as they turned around 20-3 down.

Collins led the Leicester defence a merry dance as he raced clear and found Reinach, who opened the scoring before Ford responded with a penalty. Reinach then did brilliantly to steal a turnover and as he attempted to play, Williams played the ball on the floor and was yellow-carded.

Biggar kicked a penalty and Northampton took advantage as Collins scored twice within six minutes.

Cobus Reinach scores the first try for Northampton Saints (Getty)

Three more penalties from Biggar and a yellow card for Cole when the game resumed meant Leicester were never going to come back. They grabbed late consolations through Ford and Youngs but were well beaten.

"We set up the Rob Horne match against Leicester at Twickenham and we were terribly disappointed with the way we played," said Northampton director of rugby Chris Boyd.

"I thought we disrespected that occasion. This fixture last season was when Rob had his career-ending injury so there was a little of an extra bird on the shoulder for Rob. That was part of the motivation."

Tom Collins dives over for his second try despite being held by Manu Tuialgi and Sam Aspland-Robinson (Getty Images)

Boyd also issued a positive update on England captain Dylan Hartley's knee injury. The Saints hooker was pitchside at Welford Road but has not played since December.

"Dylan went to the specialist a couple of days ago. It was really positive," Boyd said. "I'm not sure when, but I'm really optimistic Dylan will play some football before the end of the season.

"He might be three to six weeks, but he's in a really good space."

PA