North, who started his Wales career with a brace of tries on his debut against South Africa in November 2010, raced home from fully 70 metres to put Northampton Saints on their way to success at the Liberty Stadium.
It was the 21-year-old’s second score in as many European games and his third in a row in all competitions after he crossed the whitewash against Leinster in Dublin in mid-December and then again against Bath and Harlequins in the Aviva Premiership across the last fortnight.
“It was a quality try by George. He is really settling in to the way we want to play. People say he had a slow start with us, but he did some brilliant things early on in the season,” said Northampton director of rugby Jim Mallinder.
“He’s a quality player. I know he is young, but he is determined to improve and work hard at his game, which is what he’s doing. He is playing for a good club, he’s playing for Wales and he is happy.”
North’s fine showing in Swansea means Northampton still have a slim chance of reaching the Heineken Cup quarter-finals, with the Ospreys needing to stop Leinster from gaining a single match point at the RDS on Friday night and the Saints seeking the full complement at home to Castres.
The British & Irish Test Lion, who was playing in front of Wales coach Warren Gatland at the weekend, admits it’s a tough task to reach the last eight but he insists Saints haven’t yet given up hope.
“We’ve got one game left and we are going to go flat out and try to get five points,” said North.
“It has been a tough group for us to get back into after a couple of early losses, and it is now win or nothing for us against Castres. We’ve still got a chance of making it, and we will go hard until the end.
“The first-half was quite frustrating. It was quite a slow game, and we needed to bump the pace up to how we wanted to play. I had a bit of space and time for the try, so it was happy days.”
