What a night at the Sportsground! It had it all. The All Black prop making his competitive debut for the Falcons. The World Cup winning outhalf commanding a host of English internationals... few in the press gave Connacht a prayer in the build up to this match. And in fairness to them, with 25 minutes gone on the clock, Connacht were 0-10 down and it was looking like it was going to be a long night in the West.

Connacht outhalf Andy Dunne missed a third minute penalty after Newcastle had come in from the side of a maul. Six minutes later, Johnny Wilkinson split the uprights after Mike McCarthy was pinged for not rolling away. First blood to the Falcons.

The French referee Maciello who had a poor day at the office denied Michael Swift a try, calling him back for obstruction after Swift found a gap through the cover. It seemed like a harsh decision, with the crowd displeased with the French mans decision making.

It was a pivitol call as almost immediately, Newcastle scored a Try through the winger May on 23 minutes. Darren Yapp raced out of the defensive line while expecting the pass and left a hole for a searing midfield break. May finished off in the right corner. A fine try, no doubt and with the conversion by Wilkinson successful, Connacht were 10 points behind.

This only seemed to spurn Connacht into life. Aafter a number of phases, Connacht broke into the Newcastle 22 and from a quick ruck, went wide, and O'Loughlin went through the stretched defense in the 30th minute. Andy Dunne nailed a difficult touch line conversion to make it a 3 point game.

The Newcastle hooker Andy Long was sent to the bin 6 minutes later for killing the ball, however Connacht couldn't make the 1 man advantage count.

It was Wilkinson who scored next after Aidan Wynne was caught in possession on 49 minutes. But that was the last Falcons score of the game. Connacht stepped up a gear and eventually, Newcastle started to creep offside in defense. The ref called them for it in the 63rd minutes and Dunne reduced the gap to 3.

With only 3 minutes on the clock, Dunne dropped an excellent drop goal and the game looked to be heading for a draw. Then in injury time, after great work by Ray Ofisa and Brett Wilkinson, Connacht were awarded a penalty with Dunne popped over to win the game.

The forwards had a fantastic night, who were as a unit, nothing short of amazing. The backs were mostly solid, but if they can take a lead from their pack, then Connacht have a squad good enough to challenge any team at home.

A great win, and a big relief for Michael Bradley, who has now two wins from two. They say you are only as good as your last game. Well the Connacht lads must be feeling pretty good right now.

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