Cardiff see off Scarlets in Welsh derby
MATCH REPORT: Cardiff recovered from a slow start at Parc y Scarlets to claim a bonus-point victory in the United Rugby Championship.
Scarlets raced to a 15 point lead after Scarlets got onto the scoreboard off the restart within 14 seconds through Page followed by penalty by Costelow and another try by Plumtree within the space of 10 minutes.
Cardiff showed great fight to get back into the match and trail by a mere three points at the break through tries by Belcher and Grady.
The visitors found their mojo in the second-half when Millard crossed the line to take the lead for the first time and that would remain to be the case for the rest of the match – as Ben Thomas dotted down after collecting his own kick which secured the bonus-point .
There was almost a case for a red card when Ryan Elias made head-contact with Ben Donnell but there was mitigation for it to be downgraded to a yellow card.
Cardiff also suffered the same fate when in a similar instance when Belcher was sent to the sin-bin for head contact to Johnny Williams as well as a yellow card to Alec Hepburn for repeated scrum infringements.
Scarlets had a late penalty in the game to get them within striking distance, the penalty attempt went wide and that was enough to ensure Cardiff start the season with two wins from two.
Scorers:
For Scarlets:
Tries: Page, Plumtree
Con: Costelow
Pen: Costelow
For Cardiff:
Tries: Belcher, Grady, Millard, Thomas
Cons: Sheedy 2
Teams:
Scarlets: 15 Ioan Lloyd, 14 Tom Rogers, 13 Macs Page, 12 Johnny Williams, 11 Blair Murray, 10 Sam Costelow, 9 Gareth Davies, 8 Taine Plumtree, 7 Josh Macleod (captain), 6 Jarrod Taylor, 5 Max Douglas, 4 Alex Craig, 3 Henry Thomas, 2 Ryan Elias, 1 Kemsley Mathias.
Replacements: 16 Marnus van der Merwe 17 Alec Hepburn, 18 Sam Wainwright, 19 Jac Price, 20 Dan Davis, 21 Efan Jones, 22 Eddie James, 23 Ellis Mee.
Cardiff: 15 Cam Winnett, 14 Mason Grady, 13 Rey Lee-Lo, 12 Ben Thomas, 11 Iwan Stephens, 10 Callum Sheedy, 9 Aled Davies, 8 Alun Lawrence, 7 Dan Thomas, 6 Ben Donnell, 5 Teddy Williams, 4 Josh McNally, 3 Keiron Assiratti, 2 Liam Belcher (captain), 1 Corey Domachowski.
Replacements: 16 Evan Lloyd, 17 Ed Byrne, 18 Rhys Litterick, 19 Rory Thornton, 20 Mackenzie Martin, 21 Ellis Bevan, 22 Tinus de Beer, 23 Harri Millard.
Referee: Christopher Allison (South Africa)
Assistant referees: Mike English (Wales) , Amber Stamp-Dunstan (Wales)
TMO: Marius van der Westhuizen (South Africa)
Image credit: Cardiff Rugby
