Saints can’t afford a slow start against Leicester, says Dickson

Jim Mallinder’s men meet their east midlands rivals in a mouthwatering Aviva Premeirship play-off semi-final at Franklin’s Gardens.

They go into the game on the back of a 74-13 evisceration of Wasps last weekend, with 11 tries scored by Saints in that game.

But they had gone 13-0 down in the first 15 minutes as mistakes from Dickson and Ben Foden saw two scores conceded.

And the England scrum-half has warned his team-mates a similar early slumber will be costly in the bid for a place in the May 31 Twickenham showpiece.

“We didn’t start the best against Wasps and myself getting charged down wasn’t the ideal start, but it shows the character of this team,” said Dickson, who scored twice in Saturday’s success.

“We were 13-0 down and some people would have bickered and cried, but we said ‘let’s forget about that and get some points of our own’.

“We showed what we were capable of with 74 unanswered points and one of the pleasing things for us was how we were in the second half.

“It would be easy for us to fall asleep and take the win from the first half, but the way we played in that second half was phenomenal. It was relentless.

“But it was sloppy at the start and that’s not ideal and not what we wanted. We will address that this week because we can’t afford to do that again on Friday night.”