Penalty try gifts Racing a win
CHAMPIONS CUP REPORT: 2018 Champions Cup finalists Racing 92 took a 14-13 away victory from Llanelli thanks to a late penalty try in their Pool 4 opener against Scarlets.
The Welsh region opened the scoring after Ken Owens and Wyn Jones inched towards the line but were held up by a battling Racing 92 defence. Penalty advantage was being played, though, and Leigh Halfpenny kicked to give Scarlets the early lead.
Racing 92 then dominated the next 20 minutes but couldn’t take advantage despite winning several line-outs in the Scarlets 22 and Olivier Klemenczak diving over at the posts but the ball was knocked on beforehand.
The Welsh region opened the scoring after Ken Owens and Wyn Jones inched towards the line but were held up by a battling Racing 92 defence. Penalty advantage was being played, though, and Leigh Halfpenny kicked to give Scarlets the early lead.
Racing 92 then dominated the next 20 minutes but couldn’t take advantage despite winning several line-outs in the Scarlets 22 and Olivier Klemenczak diving over at the posts but the ball was knocked on beforehand.
After a decent kicking exchange, Racing 92’s Xavier Chandran was the man to break the Scarlets line and played a nice pass to Baptiste Chouzenoux who powered over for the opening try on half time with the first real moment of quality resulting in Racing taking the lead at the interval.
Scarlets hit back at the start of the second half when a driving scrum allowed Gareth Davies to nip round the blindside and jink past his man to dive over in the corner, but Halfpenny could not nail the conversion in tricky kicking conditions.
In the 57th minute, penalty advantage was being played for offside so Jonathan Davies played a deft grubber kick in behind the Racing line that caught out Simon Zebo, giving Jonathan McNicholl the chance to capitalise and he did, sliding over the try line. The conversion was wide again and that proved to haunt the Welsh region.
From a Racing 92 attacking line-out with four minutes to play, the driving maul powered towards the line before being brought down illegally. Referee Matthew Carley had no hesitation and headed to the posts to award Racing the match-winning penalty try.
Scarlets – who travel to face Leicester Tigers in Round 2 – could not create another chance as they fell to a narrow defeat. Racing 92 will host Ulster Rugby next weekend.
The scorers:
For Scarlets:
Tries: Davies, McNicholl
Con: Halfpenny
For Racing 92:
Tries: Chouzenoux, Penalty Try
Con: Russell, Penalty try dies not require a conversion
The teams:
Scarlets: 15 Leigh Halfpenny, 14 Johnny McNicholl, 13 Jonathan Davies, 12 Hadleigh Parkes, 11 Steff Evans, 10 Angus O’Brien, 9 Gareth Davies, 8 Blade Thomson, 7 Will Boyde, 6 Ed Kennedy, 5 David Bulbring, 4 Jake Ball, 3 Samson Lee, 2 Ken Owens (captain), 1 Wyn Jones
Replacements: 16 Ryan Elias, 17 Rob Evans, 18 Werner Kruger, 19 Tom Price, 20 Joshua Macleod, 21 Sam Hidalgo-Clyne, 22 Dan Jones, 23 Paul Asquith
Racing 92: 15 Simon Zebo, 14 Joe Rokocoko, 13 Olivier Klemenczak, 12 Henry Chavancy (captain), 11 Juan Imhoff, 10 Finn Russell, 9 Xavier Chauveau, 8 Antonie Claassen, 7 Baptiste Chouzenoux, 6 Wenceslas Lauret, 5 Leone Nakarawa, 4 Donnacha Ryan, 3 Cedate Gomes Sa, 2 Camille Chat, 1 Guram Gogichashvili
Replacements: 16 Teddy Baubigny, 17 Eddy Ben Arous, 18 Census Johnston, 19 Dominic Bird, 20 Boris Palu, 21 Teddy Iribaren, 22 Ben Volavola, 23 Virimi Vakatawa
Referee: Matthew Carley (England)
Assistant referees: Luke Pearce (England), Jonathan Healy (England)
TMO: Graham Hughes (England)
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