News // Hendy excited for run-in with Saints after England A runout

There is never a good time to get injured, but the shoulder problem George Hendy picked up in Northampton Saints’ victory over Bath last month felt particularly inopportune.

The 22-year-old previously had a delayed start to his campaign due to a foot issue dating back to preseason, but he took no time at all in regaining the spectacular form he had shown in the run-in of 2023/24.

Scoring tries in the first four matches he appeared in this season showed, whether he played at fullback or on the wing, Hendy was developing into one of the most dangerous young strike runners in the Gallagher Premiership.

His form in the No.15 jersey, especially, meant Saints were able to absorb the loss of captain George Furbank to a broken arm just before Christmas.

There was even talk at the start of the year of Hendy earning an England call-up for the Six Nations, only for his first match of 2025 to end prematurely against Premiership leaders Bath.

Naturally, he had already scored – his sixth try in nine games at that point – but his afternoon was over after 37 minutes in what ended up a dramatic 35-34 win for Saints.

Hendy said: “I knew it was pretty painful, but there were only about three minutes left of the first half, and it was just trying to see it out until half-time rather than having somebody come on the pitch for three minutes just to go straight back in again.

“I tried to make it to half-time, but it didn’t quite work out!

“I maybe tried to push it a couple of weeks too early and that put me back a step or two, but now I’m fully back.”

Hendy demonstrated as such by picking up from where he had left off in Saints’ 66-33 dismantling of Nottingham in the Premiership Rugby Cup that ultimately earned them a home quarter-final two weeks ago.

While some of his team-mates had the week off after this, Hendy instead had the excitement of being in the England A squad for their match against their Irish counterparts.

He came off the bench in the hosts’ 28-12 victory at Ashton Gate last Sunday – one of six Saints to feature – and it was an experience he relished.

Hendy said: “I really wanted to push when I heard about the fixture against Ireland A and that was probably my biggest goal while getting back to fitness from my shoulder injury.

“I really wanted to get back and be in contention for that England A fixture, and I was really happy when it came through that I was going.

“There were a lot of lads even younger than myself who were in that camp as well – Tobias Elliott, Joseph Woodward – so it shows you that it’s a good pathway to be in.

“Any opportunity to wear an England shirt is a pretty good one, so I was pretty happy with that.”

Hendy has already shown himself to be a player who shines at crunch time – just ask the Bath players he sailed past on his way to setting up Alex Mitchell’s title-winning try at Twickenham last year.

And he is now focused on what is effectively the start of the run-in to this campaign, this afternoon’s visit of Ealing Trailfinders in what is the first of potentially many knock-out games over the coming months.

“We’ve done a little bit of ID on them, we know that they’ll be lapping at the opportunity to play a Premiership team and they’ll really want a result because that would be massive for their campaign as well, and prove they can be a Premiership team in the future,” Hendy said.