The Top Four – that’s the ultimate ambition for Sale Sharks

Steve Diamond has no doubts on the ambition for Sale Sharks in the coming season.

“The Top Four  —   it has to be our aim, and we have to give it a real crack. We have the team now, the strength of mind, new owners, the building blocks are all there, the coaching staff are superb,  and we all have the determination to see it through. We just missed out last season – we have to ensure this season we don’t.

“I am very excited to work with this squad of players. There is a feeling, among the squad,  that we have the potential to go all the way. It will be tough, every team has strengthened and each match will be very competitive, but we know that. Our home form last season was magnificent. We have to turn the AJ Bell Stadium to a fortress once again…no team will relish coming here.

”And our away form has room for improvement. We have to dominate teams right from the go…and we can do that. We have to make Sale a Northern Powerhouse, and remember success breeds success.

“I think Friday nights will be fabulous for us – we need to play exciting, entertaining rugby that will draw in the crowds. And we are perfectly capable of that. I look around the place and I see quality, and enthusiasm, and ambition.

“No one has the right to be in the Top Four. You have to earn it, by your deeds and actions. We have instilled that into the minds of our players.”

Sale Sharks improved by one place to finish sixth in the league last season, but will look back with some regret having gone down by less than a score on four occasions and drawing two games.

It has been all change at the AJ Bell Stadium with some high-profile names leaving the club, but several players have signed new contracts and Josh Beaumont, who has recently been involved in England’s Elite Player Squad, has been named club captain.

And Diamond is confident that the ambition of the club to perform domestically and abroad : “I was frustrated last year as I felt we should have finished higher than sixth,” he said. “There were three or four games we missed out on with last kicks in games, so a bit a skill let us down there.

“But generally in the grand scheme of things we’re always around the top six so we can build on that.

“A lot of the players have signed long term contracts with us as well, and their ambition is to play for England or their other national teams.

“The way to do that is by playing against the biggest teams in Europe, and we’ve drawn some big names in that competition which is exciting.

A lot will be made of the loss of Danny Cipriani and Tommy Taylor to Wasps in the summer, but it has certainly not been all doom and gloom for Sale in terms of ins and outs.

Wales legend Mike Phillips, Aviva Premiership Rugby veteran Rob Webber, and Pro12 winning fly-half AJ MacGinty, and Exeter Chief’s running back Byron McGuigan,  have all arrived at the AJ Bell Stadium – not to mention Super League sensation Josh Charnley, who will join the club in the coming weeks – and Diamond remains upbeat.

He said: “That’s just the way that rugby goes. You lose a couple of players sometimes, and this summer we lost a couple of players to Wasps in Danny Cips and Tommy Taylor.

“You shake hands, say goodbye, and move on – I don’t get too distressed about it. I have altered the way we have done things a little bit, and now Mike Haley, Josh Beaumont, Sam James and Cam Neild have all signed four-year contracts.

” Rob Webber and AJ MacGinty have come in and the team is looking as strong as it’s ever looked in my opinion.”

Sale Today will be following Sale Sharks in the coming season, and their bid for a Top Four finish.  We will have all the news right here, and on our Facebook page.