Premiership: Leicester 21-13 Saracens

Former England fly-half Freddie Burns scored 16 of Leicester's points

Saracens surrendered the lead at the top of the Premiership to Exeter after slipping to defeat at Leicester.

Tigers led 6-3 at the break as two Freddie Burns penalties cancelled out one from Alex Goode.

But Leicester took advantage when Sarries fly-half Nils Mordt was sent to the sin-bin to score tries through Burns and Vereniki Goneva.

Goode's converted try and a second penalty cut the lead but Burns dropped a goal to settle it.

England full-back Goode had the chance to claim a losing bonus point for Saracens with virtually the last kick of the game, but he skewed his penalty wide.

Victory sees Leicester climb to fourth in the table, while Sarries slip to second after Exeter beat Northampton 20-12 earlier on Sunday.

Leicester deserved victory, having dominated possession and territory throughout the match despite having prop Logovi'i Mulipola sin-binned in the first half.

Once Mordt saw yellow, for cynically pulling back centre Peter Betham, who was running clear after charging down a kick, the Tigers took control.

Richard Wigglesworth helped inspire Saracens after coming off the bench but any chance of a late comeback was halted by Burns' calm drop-goal and Mike Ellery receiving a yellow card for a shoulder charge on Lachlan McCaffrey.

Leicester director of rugby Richard Cockerill:

"I thought it was a proper Leicester performance. The physicality was good and so was our appetite for the game.

"We've had a tough week of training both mentally and physically but we saw the results of that today. Saracens are a good side even when they are missing some key guys.

"We didn't take our opportunities in the first half when we should have had one or two tries and I did wonder if that might come back and bite us.

"We controlled the game well and there won't be any complaints from anybody about the result."

Saracens director of rugby Mark McCall:

"They took advantage of our sin-binnings in the second half much better than we did theirs in the first half.

"We fought very hard and the way we defended in the first half was outstanding. Today we lacked a bit of fire-power and we made a few fundamental errors.

"The Six Nations has hit us hard but we're very, very proud of our players. All of them have been integral to it.

"It hasn't been an easy period for us and everyone knows we've been stretched. Next week it will be great because it will be the first time in nine weeks we'll have some choices."

Leicester Tigers: Bell; Thompstone, Betham, Williams, Goneva; Burns, Kitto; Ayerza, Thacker, Mulipola, Barrow, Kitchener, Fitzgerald, McCaffrey, Crane (capt).

Replacements: Bateman, Genge, Balmain, Croft, Fonua, Harrison, Smith, Veainu.

Sin-bin: Mulipola.

Saracens: Goode; Ellery, Bosch, Barritt (capt), Wyles; Mordt, de Kock; Barrington, Brits, Figallo, Hamilton, Hargreaves, Rhodes, Brown, Wray.

Replacements: Porecki, Lamositele, Du Plessis, Smith, Fraser, Wigglesworth, Tompkins, Ransom.

Sin-bin: Mordt, Ellery.

Attendance: 22,282.

Referee: JP Doyle.