Leicester Tigers head coach Richard Cockerill paid tribute to a great culture at the club as his injury-ravaged squad beat Northampton Saints 29-15 in the Guinness Premiership.

Missing half of his 36-man squad to injury and unavailability, Cockerill picked a match-day 23 which included Tom Armes, a young back-rower who had never trained with the first team, and a 19-year-old lock in Calum Green, who found out he was making his full debut on the morning of the game.

Take the outstanding Ben Kay out of the match-day squad and nobody else in the 23 had more than 70 appearances for the club under their belt. Has a Tigers squad had such little experience for a league game in the professional era?

Yet tries from Lucas Amorosino and Anthony Allen, along with 19 points from the boot of Jeremy Staunton, took Tigers up to fourth place in the Guinness Premiership table.

"It was a massive win in the context of the league," said Cockerill. "It will give the squad huge belief and, hopefully, we can come back after two weeks of Anglo-Welsh Cup action with a few bodies back from injury.

"We pride ourselves on the squad getting us through and, more than ever on Saturday, the squad got us through.

"It shows the quality of what the Academy are doing, through to the A League team and on to the first team. There is a great culture at this club.

"When Richard Blaze rang me and said he couldn't play (with a foot injury), I rang Calum and told him he was starting. He just said 'okay' and we got on with it. There was no big deal because I don't make a fuss of it.

"I know he, like the rest of them, will put his heart and soul into it. He will give you everything he's got. I don't mind if they are not quite good enough as long as they put the effort in and everyone did that. I was delighted with their effort.

"Tom Armes came in and joined the bench. I don't think he has trained with the first team before, let alone played.

"We weren't brilliant, it was scrappy and we got the bounce of the ball on the odd occasion. Our scrum was good but our line-out was creaky near the end of the game, which was a little bit disappointing.

"But we fronted up and tackled well. I thought Martin Castrogiovanni fronted up after a poor game last week and it was good to see Lucas (Amorosino) score from 70 metres and do lots of other really good things too.

"The players wanted to do it for themselves and they wanted to show how good they were after last weekend. They have to take the credit because they were out there doing it. It's their team.

"It's always nice to beat your local rivals but the points are more important. If we had lost, there would have been a good distance between us and the top but we are only going to get better. If we can get something from Gloucester in a couple of weeks, we are in a really good position coming out of the autumn internationals."

Cockerill added that Blaze's foot was not quite right to play but did not think it would present any problems for him going back to the England camp.

He said that winger Alesana Tuilagi was back at the club but was 10 kilograms overweight.

"We are dealing with that and I am not particularly happy with him," added Cockerill.

Tigers play South Africa on Friday night and Leeds in the Anglo Welsh Cup on Sunday.

Cockerill said he had no idea whether any of his England contingent would return for either game. World Cup-winning captain John Smit leads the South African touring squad whose 37 players include nine new caps.