Tinds - top game

By Cherry Picker
November 13 2011

After staging a magnificent Heineken Cup performance at arguably the toughest away ground in the competition, Gloucester deserved a lot more than losing to a controversial late try at Toulouse.

The 21-17 scoreline suggests that Glaws went close, and that is clearly true – but it isn’t the whole story.

In fact, the cherry and whites were twice in the lead in a tense game and nine times out of ten they would probably have won.

But this was that fatal tenth time, and justice was not on the agenda.

Glaws coach Bryan Redpath was quite rightly pleased with his team’s performance, and he told the BBC: “I am delighted with the performance, we came away with a point and we have to take the positives out of that.

"We had a man (Strokosch) in the bin and had to defend for 10 minutes with 14, we gave away a couple of scrum penalties, and you have to be very clean coming here.

"They are very small decisions we have to learn from, but the commitment was top drawer. I think we have gained a bit of belief from that performance."

Only a bit of belief? Many people will argue that the performance against  a team as strong as Toulouse should do Glaws a power of good.

With Mike Tindall playing a lot better than many might have expected in the current circumstances, Glaws going 10-0 up thanks to a try from Charlie Sharples converted by Freddie Burns, who also kicked a pen.

But Luke McAllister’s pen narrowed the gap and a try from Timoci Matanavcou plus two more three-pointers from McAllister made it 14-10 at the break.

Henry Trinder’s try, converted by Burns, made it 17-14, but Clement Poitrenaud’s try stole a home win when Glaws claimed the final pass was forward.

But forget the result ands dwell on the performance – it was a cracker, setting the sort of standards Glaws need to match for the rest of the season.

It’s a tall order, but it can be done.

Battling Glaws robbed by dogy late try

Discussion started by Shedloads (IP Logged), 13/11/2011 20:20

Shedloads
13/11/2011 20:20

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