JOHN Connolly has warned Bath that they cannot take their eyes off Northampton for even a second at the Rec tomorrow.

The Australian head coach is only too aware of the dangers posed by Wayne Smith's Saints one of the favourites for the Zurich Premiership title this season.

Northampton fought back from 10 points down to snatch a draw at Sale in injury time on the opening weekend and, like Leicester, have perfected the art of stealing victory from the jaws of defeat.

And Connolly believes that is something his own new-look side still need to learn despite their own fine start aainst Leeds.

"Northampton were consistent for most of last year, their players know how to win and that's the difference,'' he said.

"Some teams just can't put other sides away and tend to lose all the close ones. But Northampton generally come through in tight ones.

"Last week, they were 10 points down at virtually full time and they got out of jail.

"We've got to finish teams off, we have to be pro-active not reactive and put the pressure on for the full 80 minutes.We only did it for 40 minutes last week.''

Connolly will stick largely to the same squad of players that delivered a 44-32 win at Headingley

"They played well and the good thing is that they realise that some things we good and some were poor,'' he added.

"It's the first step on a long road. In the first four games we play sides who are all in Europe and finished in the top five last season, so we will have a pretty good indication of where we were after that.

"We have to get away with our home games, especially walking into Sale and Wasps in the next two games. Those are two pretty hard matches.''

Northampton will take nine internationals to the Rec despite a recent run of injuries and All Black scrum-half Mark Robinson makes his first start.

Andrew Blowers (concussion), Renaud Peillard (calf) and Budge Pountney (broken leg) are all sidelined.

Head coach Wayne Smith said: "It is a mark of the quality of the players in this squad and the effort they have put in that we can go into this game with confidence despite missing three players of this calibre."

Northampton: Beal, Sleightholme, Tucker, Leslie, Reihana, Drahm, Robinson, Sturgess, Richmond, Budgen, Lord, Williams, Connors, Fox, Soden. Subs: Howard, Hyndman, Ripol, Miles, Morris, Phillips, Seely.