'I'm very lucky to do this' - Saints skipper Dingwall marks milestone in style

The England centre made his 150th appearance for the black, green and gold on Friday night, captaining the team to an enthralling 43-31 Gallagher PREM win against Saracens.

Saints roared back from 26-17 during the second half to seal a win that keeps them top of the table and unbeaten going into the break from league action.

And when asked how enjoyable it is to be part of this free-scoring Saints team, Dingwall said: "It's so much fun!

"There are a few of us who got a landmark today and I said to the boys 'never take for granted playing here'.

"We play first against second, sold out, in this stadium under the lights and I'm very lucky to do this.

"All the lads love it."

Saints finished eighth in the Gallagher PREM last season as their injury-hit title defence fell flat.

But they have their mojo back at the start of the current campaign, taking 23 points from a possible 25 so far.

"A lot of our game is built off connection and doing things repeatedly well," Dingwall said. "You start to see that when boys are playing together regularly and that was a frustration last year because it was such a fragmented year with us having injuries all over the place.

"We didn't have Mitch (Alex Mitchell) for the first half of the year, we lost Fin (Smith) for bits, we lost Colesy (Alex Coles), we lost Josh Kemeny.

"When we had everyone, we had a really good run in Europe.

"At times, you've got to have a bit of luck to have everyone fit.

"We've actually got great depth and you look at our back row with the people that we've got to come off the bench and the people who weren't even playing in this game.

"We're really fortunate that this squad is really building.

"We stood up at the start of the year and reflected, and we knew that last year wasn't good enough. Mentally, we weren't in a place where we were going after things enough.

"You saw it in this game with the way we turned up in attack because it looked like us going after a team."

Saints raced into a 17-0 lead against Saracens, only to see Mark McCall's men scored 26 unanswered points to claim what appeared a commanding advantage.

But the black, green and gold kept fighting and eventually fired as a total of four tries from Tommy Freeman helped them to victory.

"We were really frustrated with the first half, just because we did so much good stuff and there was a bit of a swing of momentum because we let them in with a few tries from nothing," Dingwall said.

"It was frustrating to go in at half-time (19-17) behind, but we knew that if we could start doing the things we're good at, we could turn the tide.

"The stuff around the discipline is all in our control, and the same goes for the attack.

"When we get things right in terms of our breakdown speed, I'm fortunate to have these unbelievable players like Fin (Smith), Freemo (Tommy Freeman) and Hutch (Rory Hutchinson) so when we get speed of ball, all of a sudden they're picking things off."

Dingwall added: "In the first half, we were getting it bang on for 20 minutes but then unfortunately a lack of discipline gave them an easy way to get into our half.

"At the back end of that half, we struggled to exit and they were doing a good job of getting after our breakdown and making it scrappy for us to get out of that area.

"In the second half, you can see we can do it from the back end of the pitch and moving the game up the pitch doesn't always have to be kicking, it can be from run to kick and we've got great people who can make decisions on the edge to do exactly that."