Director of rugby Jim Mallinder today called on the Northampton Saints team to meet head on the challenges that will come from Bath. Although the Saints are heading to the Recreation Ground on the back of a loss against a top-four rival, Mallinder says that the players are in a good frame of mind and are determined to bring home a positive result from the west country.

“There were positives to take away from last week, but there were plenty of things to work on as well,” Mallinder said. “Last Saturday’s game showed that we still have development to make as a team and we have to learn the lessons from the defeat.

“There is no better time to do that than in a tough game like we will have on Saturday. The Rec is a difficult place to play, and Bath are in good form at the moment. They have an experienced front five who showed how well they can play in last week’s win at Sale. Bath also have a strong axis at nine, 10 and 12 and good finishers out wide, so we will have to be at our best to get a positive result.

“We are certainly going into the game in a positive frame of mind. The attitude in training this week has been good with every player determined to get a good result on Saturday.”

There are a number of ways you can follow the action from the Recreation Ground on Saturday. The Saints’ official Facebook page will have the usual exclusive match blog while the club’s Twitter feed will have score updates every 10 minutes.

BBC Radio Northampton’s online commentary will be carried on PremiershipRugby.tv, where you can also watch Jim Mallinder’s preview of the game, while ESPN’s exclusively live coverage begins at 2:45pm.

NORTHAMPTON SAINTS TEAM TO PLAY BATH

Aviva Premiership Rugby Round 15

Recreation Ground

Saturday, February 19th, 2011

Kick off 3:00pm

15 Greig Tonks

14 Bruce Reihana

13 Joe Ansbro

12 Jon Clarke

11 Paul Diggin

10 Stephen Myler

9 Stuart Commins

1 Soane Tonga’uiha

2 Brett Sharman

3 Brian Mujati

4 Dan Vickerman

5 Christian Day

6 Calum Clark

7 Phil Dowson (capt)

8 Roger Wilson

Replacements

16 Andy Long

17 Alex Waller

18 Tom Mercey

19 Mark Sorenson

20 Mark Easter

21 Ryan Powell

22 Shane Geraghty

23 Scott Armstrong

Ends