EXETER boss Rob Baxter looked relived after his team had withstood Sale’s second-half pressure.
Baxter said: “That was a ding-dong battle. At the end it came down to who made the least mistakes. I’m really pleased we came through it.
“There was a huge amount of really big collisions between two very committed sides. Recent results show that Sale take some beating here,” he added in reference to how title rivals Saracens had lost here in January.
Sale’s director of rugby Steve Diamond conceded Exeter were just about the better team.

“We just could ...