Premiership: Northampton Saints 21-22 Sale Sharks - Sale climb up to sixth with fifth win in six games

Rohan Janse van Rensburg's second-half try for Sale proved decisive at Franklin's Gardens

George Furbank missed a penalty for victory with the last play of the game as Northampton were edged out by Sale.

The Sharks, leading 22-21, were desperately defending inside their own 22 and were penalised at a ruck, giving Furbank his chance from the tee.

But the miss ensured tries from Arron Reed, Sam James and Rohan Janse van Rensburg were enough for the visitors.

Juarno Augustus, Alex Coles and Alex Mitchell scored for Saints but they were kept out for the final 35 minutes.

It was a second consecutive defeat for Saints after last week's loss at Leicester and they have slipped back to eighth in the Premiership.

When scrum-half Mitchell took Courtnall Skosan's pass to score just after half-time, Saints were in the ascendency at 21-15 but Sale regained control of the game with Faf de Klerk's introduction at nine.

He helped steer Sale to their fifth win in six Premiership matches and they have climbed to sixth as their New Year surge continues.

• Premiership table

• Leicester record first win at Bath in 11 years

• Irish win London derby thriller against Saracens

• Harlequins beat Wasps for first win in four

It was de Klerk who helped create the winning try as he challenged for a high ball in Saints' half and knocked it into the path of Rob du Preez who sent Van Rensburg away to score.

Another high ball led to Sale's first try as Raffi Quirke's box-kick was taken by Reed on halfway and the in-form winger raced away to score.

Sale's second try came from an attacking scrum five metres out as they used space for the backs to send full-back James over.

Northampton director of rugby Chris Boyd:

"The games we'd lost this year we could reflect on poor performances, but we'll reflect back on this game that we did some good stuff.

"We dominated for long periods of time and were pretty good in terms of performance, but at the end of the day, all of those things that we did better than in the previous few weeks didn't translate to a win.

"We didn't convert our pressure into points, we dropped a couple of balls and it cost us 14 points - that was the story of the game."

Sale director of rugby Alex Sanderson:

"That was a game we probably should have lost. You can only play as well as the opposition allow you to and that was probably our worst performance in four or five weeks.

"But the old cliche stands that if you can play badly and win, you're in a good place, so we're in a good place.

"Sometimes I hate starts like we had because I could feel the lads felt it was easy and then they just relaxed from the kick-off.

"They got a try and then we were only three points ahead so that made it not such a good start.

"The first five minutes couldn't have gone any better for us, we work a lot on our kicking game, and we work hard on judging it so it's not luck - it's training and hard work that paid off in some of those high balls."

Northampton: Hutchinson; Sleightholme, Proctor, Dingwall (capt), Skosan; Furbank, Mitchell; Iyogun, Matavesi, Painter, Ribbans, Nansen, Wilkins, Harrison, Augustus.

Replacements: Haywood, Waller, Hill, Ratuniyarawa, Coles, Lomani, J Grayson, Francis.

Sale: S James; Roebuck, R du Preez, R Janse van Rensburg, Reed; MacGinty, Quirke; Harrison, Langdon, Oosthuizen, Wiese, JP du Preez, J-L du Preez, Ross (capt), D du Preez.

Replacements: Taylor, McIntyre, Jones, Barrow, Nield, De Klerk, Doherty, McGuigan.

Referee: Tom Foley (RFU).

• Rugby Weekly Union podcast - listen and subscribe here