Brave Blossoms beat Bears
On Friday night at Parc Eirias in Colwyn Bay, North Wales, Japan beat Russia 40-13 after the scores were level at 13-all at the break.
This was Japan's third match in six days after losing 42-17 to Scotland last weekend and then 40-5 to Gloucester on Tuesday. Of the team beaten by Gloucester 13 played against Russia.
Japan scored first when fullback Ayumu Goromaru goaled a penalty but then Russia latched onto a Japanese handling error and wing Vladimir Ostroushko raced after a kick and scored. Ramil Gayshin converted. Despite Japanese domination Russia led.
Japan's pack was on top and Goromaru broke and set up a try for Hendrik Tui. 10-7 but two penalties by Gayshin restored Russia's lead till Goromaru levelled the scores.
The first half had belonged to Japan, except on the scoreboard. The second half was entirely theirs as flank Michael Broadhurst scored a try and then Male Sa'u scored two tries, the first after bursting through the centre and racing over 30 metres to score. Kosei Ono kicked a diagonal and Toshiaki Hirose scored the fifth try.
Japan now go off to Madrid to play Spain on 23 November 2013.
Scorers:
For Japan:
Tries: Tui, Broadhurst, Sa'u 2, Hirose
Cons: Goromaru 3
Pens: Goromaru 3
For Russia:
Try: Ostroushko
Con: Gayshin
Pens: Gayshin 2
Teams
Japan: 15 Ayumu Goromaru, 14 Toshiaki Hirose (captain), 13 Male Sa'u, 12 Yu Tamura, 11 Yoshikazu Fujita, 10 Kosei Ono, 9 Fumiaki Tanaka, 8 Ryu Koliniasi Holani, 7 Michael Broadhurst, 6 Hendrik Tui, 5 Hitoshi Ono , 4 Luke Thompson, 3 Kensuke Hatakeyama, 2 Shota Horie, 1 Masataka Mikami.
Replacements: 16 Hiroki Yuharai, 17 Hisateru Hirashima, 18 Hiroshi Yamashita, 19 Shinya Makabe, 20 Justin Ives, 21 Atsushi Hiwasa, 22 Seiichi Shimomura, 23 Akihito Yamada .
Russia: 15 Ramil Gaysin, 14 Vasily Artemyev, 13 Dmitry Gerasimov, 12 Alexey Makovetskiy, 11 Vladimir Ostroushko, 10 Sergey Sugrobov, 9 Anton Ryabov, 8 Victor Gresev, 7 Pavel Butenko, 6 Alexander Khudyakov, 5 Andrey Garbuzov, 4 Alexander Voytov (capt), 3 Evgeny Pronenko, 2 Valery Tsnobiladze, 1 Grigory Tsnobiladze.
Replacements: 16 Vladislav Korshunov, 17 Sergey Sekisov, 18 Innokentiy Zykov, 19 Denis Antonov, 20 Artem Fatakhov, 21 Alexey Shcherban, 22 Igor Galinovskiy, 23 Denis Simplikevich.
Referee: Luke Pearce (England)
