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Castres snatch late win over Gloucester

CHAMPIONS CUP REPORT: Castres Olympique rounded off their Champions Cup campaign with a 24-22 comeback victory over Gloucester after a late Ma’ama Vaipulu try.

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Henry Trinder gave the visitors the early advantage after just two minutes following a nice set of passes between the try-scorer and Clarke.

Gloucester then took a 14-0 lead after Ben Vellacott grabbed the second try of the evening, with the conversion slotted over by Owen Williams.

A try for the home side came just before half-time from centre Florian Vialelle meaning the 2018 Challenge Cup winners led by just seven points at the interval after Rory Kockott popped over the conversion.

The French side then drew level after the break through Vialelle again who ran in his second score following a pair of excellent offloads from the Castres backs. Kockott converted to make it 14 apiece with 25 minutes remaining.

Williams first kicked Gloucester ahead with a penalty and then scored a try as he got on the end of Gareth Evans’ cross kick to Matt Banahan who offloaded inside for a simple finish.

Centre Vialelle then played an offload to Armand Batlle for him to dive over in the corner, making it a three-point game.

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And after a flurry of attacks from the home side, Ma’ama Vaipulu collected a quick pass to dive over and clinch the win for Castres in the final seconds.

The scorers:

For Castres:
Tries: Vialelle 2, Batlle, Vaipulu
Cons: Kockett 2

For Gloucester:
Tries: Trinder, Vellacott, Williams
Cons: Williams 2
Pen: Williams

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Teams:

Castres: 15 Scott Spedding, 14 Martin Laveau, 13 Florian Vialelle, 12 Julien Caminati, 11 Armand Batlle, 10 Yohan Le Bourhis, 9 Rory Kockott, 8 Maama Vaipulu, 7 Camille Gerondeau, 6 Yannick Caballero (captain), 5 Thibault Lassalle, 4 Christophe Samson, 3 Marc Clerc, 2 Marc-Antoine Rallier, 1 Tapu Falatea.
Replacements: 16 Kevin Firmin, 17 Antoine Tichit, 18 Wilfrid Hounkpatin, 19 Steve Mafi, 20 Kevin Gimeno, 21 Ludovic Radosavljevic, 22 Robert Ebersohn, 23 Yohan Domenech.

Gloucester: 15 Tom Hudson, 14 Matt Banahan, 13 Henry Trinder, 12 Owen Williams, 11 Ollie Thorley, 10 Lloyd Evans, 9 Ben Vellacott, 8 Freddie Clarke, 7 Lewis Ludlow (captain), 6 Gareth Evans, 5 Gerbrandt Grobler, 4 Tom Savage, 3 Ciaran Knight, 2 Henry Walker, 1 Alex Seville.
Replacements: 16 Todd Gleave, 17 Paddy McAllister, 18 Josh Hohneck, 19 Ed Slater, 20 Alex Craig, 21 Charlie Chapman, 22 Tom Seabrook, 23 Charlie Sharples.

Referee: Nigel Owens (Wales)
Assistant referees: Adam Jones (Wales), Wayne Davies (Wales)
TMO: Stefano Penne (Italy)

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