Chris Wyles believes Saracens face a crucial run of Premiership games that will define their season as they prepare to face Newcastle Falcons at Allianz Park on Saturday.

The visitors have won four consecutive games but Sarries are second and could close the five-point gap to Exeter with a win.

Wyles is fully aware his side need to maintain their form, with a number of key players, including Owen Farrell and Maro Itoje, on Six Nations duty with England.

He said: "This is quite an important block of league games for us in terms of bringing the right attitude, with some of the international players away we want to make sure we perform in the way we know we can.

"We need to bring the right attitude and that will hopefully show in defence, we've got a lot of respect for what they can bring in terms of the quality of their players; hopefully, it'll be a great start to the next block of games."

The American wing is wary of the threat posed by the Aviva Premiership’s form side, who are sixth in the table and could still mount a play-off push.

He added: "We've got a good Newcastle team coming to play us at home, so that's an exciting challenge and after a good block of Anglo-Welsh Cup games I think the boys are looking forward to getting back into Premiership action.

"A lot has been said about Newcastle's attacking players, they've got a lot of dangerous runners and we'll be giving them due respect."

Saturday also marks the five-year anniversary of Saracens' first game at Allianz Park and Wyles, who has been with the club for every step over those five years, says that it's a great place to go and play and wants to mark the anniversary in the right way.

"There's been quite a few fun memories at Allianz Park, there have definitely been some fantastic tries scored there as the surface lends itself to good attacking rugby,” concluded Wyles – who will retire at the end of the season.

"Overall, it's a really good place to go and play; the fans have really brought into it, we get great support and great voice from them and I really relish going there to play. It's been a really awesome place for us to build momentum and create a really strong atmosphere."