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Cruel ending for the Lions sees Leinster extend their unbeaten run
Leinster battled back from 15 points down to preserve their unbeaten URC record this season and secure a last-gasp 39-36 victory over the Lions. It was a cruel ending for the Lions who were exciting in attack and crossed for tries through Edwill van der Merwe, Gianni Lombard, Marius Louw and Francke Horn as well as being awarded a penalty try but the defeat was a blow to their playoff hopes.
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Vakhtang Abdaladze, Liam Turner, Michael Milne, Rob Russell and Chris Cosgrave went over for Leinster as the Irish province secured a 16th win from 17 games. It took Leinster just two minutes to open the scoring.
Abdaladze celebrated his first start for Leinster as he burst clear and had a 30-metre run to the line to touch down under the posts. Sam Prendergast added the straightforward conversion.
The Lions hit back after 13 minutes when Sanele Nohamba’s pass after a lineout-out win set wing van der Merwe away and he broke through a series of weak Leinster tackles to score and Nohamba sent his conversion attempt off the post.
The home side defended resolutely and after soaking up Leinster pressure, Lombard scored his first URC try to give the Lions the lead. The fly-half kicked a loose ball forward and chased it down himself to touch down with Nohamba’s conversion putting the Lions 12-7 ahead.
Rob Russell reaches over and secures the try for @leinsterrugby! ? #BKTURC #URC | #LIOvLEI pic.twitter.com/0L6LQ5hiVP
— BKT United Rugby Championship (URC) (@URCOfficial) April 15, 2023
Back came Leinster and the ball was played along the backs to outside centre Turner, who spotted a gap in the Lions backline to burst clear and touch down in the corner with Prendergast restoring Leinster’s lead.
But a minute later the Lions responded with a superb try. Lombard burst clear and offloaded to van der Merwe, who sold a dummy to break clear and play a short pass to Nohamba and his behind-the-back pass found Louw to run in unopposed.
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They extended their advantage when number eight Horn burst through four tackles to score in the corner and secure the bonus point.
Leinster, who announced on Saturday that Springboks head coach Jacques Nienaber will join Leo Cullen’s staff next season, cut the gap six minutes after the break as they took advantage of pressure deep in the Lions half when Milne carried the ball from the back of a ruck to dive over.
The Lions were then awarded a penalty try after Cosgrave was yellow-carded for a deliberate knock-on to extend their lead to 15 points.
Prendergast booted a penalty before his delightful chip enabled Russell to gather and score in the right corner as Leinster rallied before Cosgrave weaved his way through and Prendergast’s kick levelled the scores. Prendergast then sent over a penalty with the last kick of the game to win it.
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Comments on RugbyPass
🤦♂️🤣 who cares who’s the best . All I know is the All Blacks have the star coach but have few star players now …
26 Go to commentsJe suis sûr que Farrell est impatient de jouer avec Lopez et Machenaud et d’être entraîné par Collazo… 🤭
1 Go to commentsAn on field red (aka a full red) in SRP must surely carry a bigger suspension than a red card given by the bunker as that carries a 20 minute team punishment. Had Damon Murphy abdicated his responsibility as a ref and issued both Drua players a yellow, which would have been upgraded to a 20 minute red by the bunker, that would have killed Australia and New Zealand’s push for the 20 minute red to be trialled globally from July this year.
11 Go to commentsEver so often you all post a Danny Care story that isn’t the announcement that he has finally re-signed for one more, victory tour season at Quins and I’m just like, “well you fooled me again!” My absolute favorite player ever, we need to make his final year at the Stoop (and Twickers) official already. I know he supposedly snubbed France but I won’t feel better until he signs.
1 Go to commentslate hit what late hit it wasn’t at all late and can clearly see he was committed before the tackle
1 Go to commentsChristian Lio -Willies 2 try perfomance was a standout. As was captain Scott Barrett. Up front was where the boys won it.They are a great team and players. Fantastic Crusades , you can keep going.
1 Go to commentsI don't know how the locals feel about that? I guess if you call yourselves the Worcester Wasps that might be appease. But really we need more teams in the Premiership in my view so they are not padding it out as they are at the moment. It might curtail so many players going abroad as well
5 Go to commentsNZ 😭😭😭is certainly rivaling England for best whingers cup!😭😭😭 !!!
26 Go to commentsYup. New Zealand won 3 out of 10 world cups played. SA 4 out of 8 attempts 30 Vs 50 per cent.🤔🤔
26 Go to commentsShould've done this years ago. Change Saturday kick off times to around 11am. Up and off and back home before 3pm, limit travel time too. Allows players to actually do something else with their Saturday that's family oriented or being rugby fans they could ‘watch’ pro rugby. Increases crowds etc. How can anyone that enjoys grassroots and pro rugby have to choose between the two on Saturdays?
9 Go to commentsI bet he inspired those supporters just as much.
1 Go to commentsBen Smith Springboks living rent free in his head 😊😂
67 Go to commentsGood to hear he would like to play the game at the highest level, I hadn’t been to sure how much of a motivator that was before now. Sadly he’s probably chosen the rugby club to go to. Try not to worry about all the input about how you should play rugby Joey and just try to emulate what you do on the league field and have fun. You’ll limit your game too much (well not really because he’s a standard athlete like SBW and he’ll still have enough) if you’re trying to make sure you can recycle the ball back etc. On the other hard, you can totally just try and recycle by looking to offload any and everywhere if you’re going to ground 😋
1 Go to commentsThis just proves that theres always a stat and a metric to use to justify your abilities and your success. Ben did it last week by creating an imaginary competition and now you did the same to counter his argument and espouse a new yardstick for success. Why not just use the current one and lets say the Boks have won 4 world cups making them the most successful world cup team. Outside of the world cup the All Blacks are the most successful team winning countless rugby championships and dominating the rankings with high win percentages. Over the last 4 years statistically the Irish are the best having the highest win rate and also having positive records against every tier 1 side. The most successful Northern team in the game has been England with a world cup title and the most six nations titles in history. The AB’s are the most dominant team in history with the highest win rate and 3 world cups. Lets not try to reinvent the wheel. Just be honest about the actual stats and what each team has been good at doing and that will be enough to define their level of success.
26 Go to commentsHow is 7’s played there? I’m surprised 10 or 11 man rugby hasn’t taken off. 7 just doesn’t fit the 15s dynamics (rules n field etc) but these other versions do.
9 Go to commentsPick Swinton at your peril A liability just like JWH from the Roosters Skelton ??? went missing at RWC
14 Go to commentsLike tennis, who have a ranking system, and I believe rugby too, just measure over each period preceding a world cup event who was the longest number one and that would be it. In tennis the number one player frequently is not the grand slam winner. I love and adore the All Blacks since the days of Ian Kirkpatrick when I was a kid in SA. And still do because they are the masters of running rugby and are gentleman on and off the field - in general. And in my opinion they have been the majority of the time the best rugby team in the world.
26 Go to commentsHaving overseas possessions in 2024 is absurd. These Frenchies should have to give the New Caledonians their freedom.
21 Go to commentsBell injured his foot didn’t he? Bring Tupou in he’ll deliver when it counts. Agree mostly but I would switch in the Reds number 8 Harry Wilson for Swinton and move Rob Valentini to 6 instead. Wilson is a clever player who reads the play, you can’t outmuscle the AB’s and Springboks, if you have any chance it’s by playing clever. Same goes for Paisami, he’s a little guy who doesn’t really trouble the likes of De Allende and Jordie Barrett. I’d rather play Carter Gordon at 12 and put Michael Lynagh’s boy at 10. That way you get a BMT type goalkicker at 10 and a playmaker at 12. Anyways, just my two cents as a Bok supporter.
14 Go to commentsThanks Brett, love your articles which are alway pertinent. It’s a difficult topic trying to have a panel adjudicating consistently penalties for red card issues. Many of the mitigating reasons raised are judged subjectively, hence the different outcomes. How to take away subjective opinions?
11 Go to comments