Bleak run continues for Exeter Chiefs

Exeter Chiefs remain rooted to the bottom of the Gallagher Premiership and without a win from eight league games this season after a lacklustre 28-10 defeat at Sale.

Luke James opened the scoring for Sale and Joe Carpenter dotted down a second, as the Chiefs struggled to find any rhythm in attacking areas. A penalty try for the hosts effectively ended Exeter hopes early in the second period.

Jimmy Roots provided some consolation with a solitary try for the Chiefs but a Jonny Hill score confirmed the Sale win, leaving Exeter with a lot of soul searching to be done over the Christmas period.

Exeter director of rugby Rob Baxter told BBC Radio Devon: "You can't fault the lads for the effort that's going in on the field, they're laying it on the line.

"Can we be better in areas? Of course we can, but we've got to really try to get out of this discipline cycle.

"It sounds quite a lot 28-10, but when you look where two of the scores came from where it went penalty, penalty, penalty, penalty and they score and we're given a yellow card - and we do that twice.

"If you remove those two you're sitting there at 14-10 and going 'this is a pretty tight, pressure game and we're right in it.'

"We've got to somehow break the cycle."