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The two sides have had contrasting campaigns with the hosts eighth and on the brink of top four elimination, while Leicester are in fourth and have enjoyed a stark contrast to last season's poor campaign that saw them miss out on the play-offs.
The two sides have had contrasting campaigns with the hosts eighth and on the brink of top four elimination, while Leicester are in fourth and have enjoyed a stark contrast to last season's poor campaign that saw them miss out on the play-offs.
Leicester were beaten 38-31 last time out at Gloucester and Northampton suffered a 22-19 loss away at Harlequins.
Pearson and Munga proving to be tackle machines
In their defeat to Gloucester, Northampton flanker Tom Pearson completed 23 tackles - the highest of the round and seventh highest of the season. His fellow forward Chunya Munga has also proven rock solid in his defence possessing the highest tackle success rate in the league among players who have made at least 50 successful tackles (95.3%).
Juarno Augustus broke the gainline on ten carries in round 11 against Harlequins, the joint highest total in the round but is up against Olly Cracknell, who has made a league-leading 163 carries this season, 31 of which have been dominant.
Liebenberg is a safe pair of hands
Hanro Liebenberg leads with league with 56 clean catches off lineouts this season, while his winger Ollie Hassell-Collins is an ever-present having played in all 880 minutes of Leicester's campaign so far.
Leicester's scrummaging is high risk but high reward
Looking at the team's attacking stats there's very little to split the two teams. Their turnovers won, penalties conceded rates and lineout successes are almost identical.
But it's at the scrum where they differ. Northampton have the second highest scrum success rate of 93.55%, while Leicester have the league's lowest at 83.56%. You'd probably expect it to go the other way considering their league positions but when you look at scrum penalties won, the evidence is telling.
Northampton have won just seven scrum penalties which leaves them ninth in that area, while Leicester's gamble in the scrum is paying off with a whopping 25 won, which is the highest in the Premiership.