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News article – Style E 2998

News article – Style E 2998

Both Leinster and Connacht were victorious in Friday evening’s Celtic Cup action. Leinster beat Neath-Swansea Ospreys 35-21 and Connacht overcame The Borders 26-21.

Both Leinster and Connacht were victorious in Friday evening’s Celtic
Cup action. Leinster beat Neath-Swansea Ospreys 35-21 and Connacht overcame
The Borders 26-21.

Leinster overcame a brave Neath-Swansea display to emerge triumphant after
the sides’ Celtic Cup battle at Donnybrook. The home team opened the scoring
through Leek, who went over after some solid work by the Leinster pack. He then
converted and McWeeney was the next Leinster man to cross the line. Leek promptly
converted before Neath-Swansea had even registered a score. But Henson, soon
opened the record with a penalty.

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With Neath-Swansea’s Millward sin-binned, Dillon scored a great Leinster try
following a clever flick from Jennings. Leek, again, converted while Henson
put over a penalty for the opposition before the interval.

Neath-Swansea began the second half brightly with a great individual try from
Elvis Sevalai’l, but Henson failed to convert, dampening the visitor’s comeback
plans.

They were not deterred for long though. Leek managed a drop goal but Henson
clocked up a spectacular individual try at the left corner and converted his
effort. With newfound confidence Neath-Swansea began to pile on the pressure
and were unlucky not to score.

But in the end it was easy for the home team. They registered a penalty which
Leek saw over before Christian Warner intercepted to touch down for the finest
try of the evening.

Full Details at: www.leinsterrugby.ie

A late Connacht fight back did just enough to secure victory after a very close
encounter of The Borders’ kind on Friday evening. The Scottish side led with
just four minutes remaining, but Connacht, through Mark McHugh, took two penalty
chances to edge in front as the final whistle sounded.

The Border’s problems had begun even before they entered the pitch as veteran
Doddie Weir was forced to withdraw from the side after coming down with flu.
Their day was made no happier when moments into the clash, scrum-half Chris
Custier was sidelined with a wrist injury. Despite their problems, they were
the ones to register the first penalty and Connacht soon realized that it was
game on.

The Irish side looked to veteran Eric Elwood for inspiration and he answered
the call with a string of penalties before Morton registered again. Elwood then
took a drop goal to leave the score 9-15 in favour of Connacht, but a great
Borders’ try had the Western men trembling. Andy Turnbull sprinted towards the
Connacht line and took the first try of the evening and Connacht looked in trouble
at the break.

On the restart, Morton added a drop goal to the Scottish tally to put them
six in front before Connacht’s McCarthy hit back with the much-needed try. McHugh
missed the conversion, but he made up for the mistake by taking the last two
penalties.

Full Details at: www.connachtrugby.ie