George Ford passed some notable landmarks in Premiership rugby as well as captaining Leicester Tigers to derby victory on Saturday.
Fly-half Ford led the team to a 55-26 win at Northampton Saints with club captain Ellis Genge in the stands as part of the England squad in preparation for the autumn internationals.
He also collected the Gallagher man-of-the-match award and was voted Fans’ Favourite by supporters on the Tigers club app, but also hit other memorable points-scoring marks on the day.
Ford’s first kick of the afternoon, which gave Tigers the lead in the fourth minute of the game, took him to to 1,489 Premiership points, one ahead of World Cup hero Jonny Wilkinson, in the league’s all-time scoring charts.
He added two conversions in the first half and then a remarkable drop goal from long range as Tigers ran down the clock of a spell with just 13 men on the field, during which Ford filled in at scrum-half.
Then a penalty just after the hour mark which helped to stem the flow of the Northampton fightback made Ford only the eighth player to reach 1,500 points in Premiership Rugby on the way to an individual 20-point haul or the afternoon.
Statistician Stuart Farmer noted that former Sale and Saracens fly-half Charlie Hodgson is the only player to reach that mark younger than 28-year-old Ford.
Ford has scored exactly 800 of those points in 79 appearances during two spells with Tigers since coming through the club’s academy.
