A Tale Of Two Halves As Five-Try Connacht Are Reeled In By Scarlets

Despite a brilliant display of attacking rugby that yielded five first half tries, Connacht fell to a 41-36 defeat to the Scarlets in a thrilling final Guinness PRO14 game of the season.

John Porch, Abraham Papali’i, Kieran Marmion, Sean O’Brien and Dominic Robertson-McCoy all touched down before the break, taking advantage of yellow cards for Scarlets front rowers Marc Jones and Pieter Scholtz.

However, the visitors, who had already cemented third spot in Conference B, had no response to a a rip-roaring Scarlets comeback as they took their own try haul to six.

It was a big night for Dylan Tierney-Martin as the former Ireland Under-20 hooker made his senior debut for the province as a second half replacement.

The Scarlets needed a win to join Connacht as in the Heineken Champions Cup draw for next season and they started with intent. Flanker Aaron Shingler crossed in the left corner after a well-crafted second-minute move.

Connacht settled themselves thereafter, however, and began to take control of the contest. With a rock-solid set piece, they began to string phases together deep inside the Scarlets 22.

After a typically sturdy scrum, Tom Daly combined with Conor Fitzgerald who passed to Porch and the full-back showed great pace to get over. Fitzgerald converted for a 7-5 lead.

With their tails up, Connacht soon added a second try. Marmion’s incisive break set up field position and, with advantage accruing, Fitzgerald’s fizzing pass found Papali’i and he used a big fend to finish off an excellently-made try.

Two tries soon became three as Connacht showed all of their attacking flair and pace. A huge break from O’Brien saw the centre pass to Porch. The Australian then made an incision of his own through the Scarlets defence before offloading back for O’Brien to score.

Fitzgerald followed up with the conversion to put 14 points between them, but the Scarlets closed the gap on the half hour mark. Captain Steff Hughes dived over via a beautiful offload from Steff Evans.

Nonetheless, Connacht finished with a flourish before the interval, notching two quick-fire tries to bring their first half total to five.

Firstly, Robertson-McCoy, whose set piece work, as well as his ball carrying, was superb, smashed his way over from close range. Fitzgerald added the extras once again.

Then, after a huge break through the middle from Niall Murray, Daly cut through and his pass back inside bounced and was picked up by Marmion for a deserved score, converted crisply by Fitzgerald.

Frustratingly for Connacht and their fans, watching on from home, the 21-point advantage was not enough in the end as the Scarlets took a stranglehold of the second period.

Fired up to pursue that coveted European place, they pulled a try back in the 44th minute. Centre Hughes completed his brace with Dan Jones supplying the conversion.

Another try followed six minutes later when scrum half Dane Blacker – following a break and offload from second row Sam Lousi – ran in a converted score to suddenly reduce the arrears to 33-26.

With the momentum now firmly behind them, the Scarlets added two more tries – Tom Rogers and replacement prop Javan Sebastian were the scorers – along with a Jones penalty to claim an action-packed bonus point win.

Jack Carty’s late penalty collected a second bonus point for Connacht, but they were trumped by the Scarlets due to that decisive run of 29 unanswered points in as many minutes.