Christie’s happy to step up to the plate
SARACENS director of rugby Mark McCall has revealed how Scotland flanker Andy Onyeama-Christie has helped fill the leadership void left by Owen Farrell and co.
The 25-year-old stepped up in pre-season when the club’s England contingent were away as he got over the agony of the end of his last campaign.
Farrell and the Vunipola brothers headed to France in the summer taking more than a decade’s experience at the club each with them and leaving a gaping hole in the ranks.
Blindside Onyeama-Christie suffered a second broken arm in a year that saw him miss the business end of the club season and Scotland’s summer tour to the Americas.
His first fracture forced him to miss Saracens’ 2023 Premiership-winning finale but the youngster has brushed the double blow off to become a central figure in a new-look Saracens under captain Maro Itoje, and scored two tries in the win against Gloucester last weekend.
McCall said: “From day one of pre-season he was the person who set the best example in all aspects of being the club we want to be. He came back the fittest of everybody, he had a phenomenal off-season.
“He is a very well-respected part of this club. He is very young and he is turning into a really good rugby player.”
“He has had some big disappointments at the end of the last two seasons and missed out on some big matches. He has been firing on all cylinders and showed some real leadership qualities in the course of those nine weeks, especially when the England players weren’t here.
Christie added: “I have been lucky to witness and play with those guys for a number of years. We miss them off, and on the pitch, they are incredible people as well as players. It is not a case of trying to replace them because they are characters that can’t be replaced. It is a case of trying to evolve whatever we are doing and trying to be the team that suits the people we have got in the room. I have probably stepped up a little bit but other people have gained more of a voice in the room as well.
“There are the obvious candidates who have always been that way, for a number of years, and have stepped up even more. I am talking your Maros, who has stepped up as captain, Jamie George, Ben Earl, Elliot Daly and others. We are very lucky with how much talent and brainpower we have still got here. It is not a massive concern, those guys were brilliant for a number of years but now is the time to move on.”
Meanwhile McCall heaped praise on Argentina boss Felipe Contepomi for the way he has managed Saracens’ two Puma stars, flanker Juan Martin Gonzalez and centre Lucio Cinti. Contempomi resisted the temptation to play the pair in Argentina’s earlier summer internationals and both have been pivotal in their country’s best showing in the Rugby Championship.
And McCall is confi-dent they will return to the club fit and firing next week after Contempomi’s shrewd management.
“Felipe was pretty brave the way he treated our two players,” he said. “He could have played them in June Test matches, which he chose not to do, as he was aware sometimes the players who play in the Premiership have almost non-stop seasons. Those two players, who had been at the World Cup, had a full off-season, five weeks off and a pre-season of four weeks – the same as everyone here. For a new coach to come in, who is probably looking to win his first few games, that was a really mature decision, a really forward-thinking decision. Juan and Lucio won’t come back to us tired and needing a rest, they have had the same pre-season as everyone else.”
