Saracens director of rugby Brendan Venter believes the strength of their scrum was the biggest reason behind their win at Leeds Carnegie.

The Men in Black got off the mark with their first win on the road this season following tries from David Strettle and Schalk Brits. But Venter insists their setpiece was the crucial difference in helping Sarries right the wrongs from their disappointing defeat at Headingley last season.

Venter said: “Mainly it was because of the progress we’ve made in the scrum. If you remember last year here we were struggling and I was saying we had a lot of people away and injured. Now Matt Parr [prop] comes on and does really well. I just said to our two young forward coaches in there that we won because of our setpiece.

“If you look at all the games Leeds disrupt teams and they have beaten Wasps a couple of times after disrupting their setpiece. Leeds disrupted Bath’s lineout and also Gloucester’s. Our setpiece was superb and Alex Sanderson and Paul Gustard [coaches] deserve a massive pat on the back."