Scarlets punish Ospreys in Llanelli

MATCH REPORT: Scarlets kept their end-of-season play-off hopes alive with a 38-22 bonus-point win over Ospreys in a pulsating Welsh derby.

The victory did not look likely when they trailed 0-17 after only 14 minutes, but two yellow cards in quick succession heralded an Ospreys collapse as the visitors conceded 38 unanswered points.

Blair Murray, Vaea Fifita, Joe Roberts, Eddie James and Taine Plumtree scored Scarlets’ tries. There was also a penalty try awarded, with Ioan Lloyd adding three conversions.

Morgan Morris, Iestyn Hopkins and Dan Edwards crossed for Ospreys, with Edwards kicking two conversions and a penalty.

Scarlets made an awful start, with two basic errors gifting their opponents a try within the first minute.

Ellis Mee failed to collect the kick-off and, from the resulting line-out, Alex Craig lost possession in the in-goal area for Morris to dive on the ball and score.

Edwards converted and added a penalty before Scarlets conceded a second try.

Ospreys broke from inside their own half before Hopkins kicked ahead, with the fullback on hand to take advantage of Lloyd’s failure to sniff out the danger.

Scarlets badly needed a boost and it came with a try from Murray after their pack had exerted their first period of pressure.

Murray’s try was the catalyst for his side to dominate the second quarter and they turned the game on its head, with Ospreys having two players sin-binned and conceding two tries.

George McGuigan was first to go for repeated team offences, with the visitors collapsing the driving line-out to result in a penalty try and a yellow card for Kieran Hardy.

Fifita, on his 50th appearance for the region, soon added a second try to bring the scores level at 17-17 at the interval.

Four minutes after the restart a flowing move saw Roberts put Scarlets in front for the first time before Ospreys returned to their full complement.

It made no difference as the home side soon extended their lead when James took advantage of a favourable bounce from a well-judged cross-field kick from Lloyd.

Scarlets sealed victory when a burst from Sam Lousi set up a chance for Plumtree before home skipper Josh Macleod picked up a late yellow card to allow Edwards to have the final say with a splendid individual try.

The scorers:

For Scarlets:
Tries: Murray, Penalty Try, Fifita, Roberts, James, Plumtree
Cons: Lloyd 3

For Ospreys:
Tries: Morris, Hopkins, Edwards
Cons: Edwards 2
Pen: Edwards

Yellow cards: George McGuigan (Ospreys, 32′); Kieran Hardy (Ospreys, 33′)

Teams:

Scarlets: 15 Blair Murray, 14 Macs Page, 13 Joe Roberts, 12 Eddie James, 11 Ellis Mee, 10 Ioan Lloyd, 9 Gareth Davies, 8 Taine Plumtree, 7 Josh Macleod, 6 Vaea Fifita, 5 Alex Craig, 4 Henry Thomas, 2 Marnus van der Merwe, 1 Alex Hepburn.
Replacements: 16 Ryan Elias, 17 Sam O’Connor, 18 Sam Wainwright, 19 Jac Price, 20 Jarrod Taylor, 21 Efan Jones, 22 Ioan Nicholas, 23 Dan Davis.

Ospreys: 15 Iestyn Hopkins, 14 Luke Morgan, 13 Evardi Boshoff, 12 Owen Williams, 11 Ryan Conbeer, 10 Dan Edwards, 9 Kieran Hardy, 8 Morgan Morris, 7 Jac Morgan (captain), 6 Tristan Davies, 5 Adam Beard, 4 James Ratti, 3 Ben Warren, 2 George McGuigan, 1 Gareth Thomas.
Replacements: 16 Dewi Lake, 17 Steffan Thomas, 18 Tom Botha, 19 Rhys Davies, 20 Morgan Morse, 21 Luke Davies, 22 Phil Cokanasiga, 23 Max Nagy.

Referee: Griffin Colby (South Africa)
Assistant referees: Craig Evans (Wales), Ellis Poulden (Wales)
TMO: Marius van der Westhuizen (South Africa)