Alex Sanderson believes Sale’s lethal attack can carry them all the way to another Premiership final after they saw off play-off rivals Harlequins 37-31 on Sunday.

Arron Reed scored two tries on his 100th Sharks appearance, while Ben Curry, Sam Dugdale and Raffi Quirke also crossed at the Salford Community Stadium.

Quins trailed 22-10 at half time but fought back, with Louis Lynagh scoring two tries and Cadan Murley, Oscar Beard and Luke Northmore also dotting down. Sale held on and are now six sixth in the table, one place behind their opponents.

They will likely need two wins from their last three matches to have a chance of making the play-offs and Sanderson is determined they will not be outworked.

“I was really tense towards the end, it was squeaky bum time, as it feels most weeks,” he said. “I said at half time you are going to have to work all the way to the final whistle. We had said the same pre-game as well. Byron McGuigan did the pre-game chat and said to the boys, ‘are you prepared to work harder than them for 80 minutes?’.

“I’m so proud of that, proud of the five points, of how we’re attacking at the moment, and we are looking much more dangerous.

“I’m not so happy with how we failed to control the middle of the field, we lost a few of the kicking battles. I think we can work around the corner better, and a little harder defensively, and that would have shored up a couple of tries and meant I haven’t lost some years of my life in the last five minutes.

“Harlequins may have got two points, but if we keep racking up five then we’ll be alright. We had a good start, and it wasn’t so good towards the end but I’ll take it, its five points.”