The Scarlets stunned title-chasing Glasgow Warriors 23-0 at Parc y Scarlets to secure their first win of the URC campaign.
Dwayne Peel’s side have been rooted to the bottom of the table since the start of the new season, winless and pointless after the first five rounds, but a heroic shift from a changed side saw them down the fifth-placed Warriors.
The Welsh outfit’s powerful forward pack helped them get the upper hand early doors, and made that count in the 15th minute as Josh Macleod added his name to the scoresheet after flopping from the base of a powerful rolling maul. Sam Costelow’s kick sailed through the uprights to make it 7-0 to the Scarlets.
On a night where chances were few and far between in the loose, largely due to the greasy conditions in Llaneli, the boot of Wales international Costelow gave the hosts their next points, with the fly-half slotting two penalties to make it 13-0 heading into the half-time break.
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Their dominance continued in the early exchanges of the second-half as Macs Page nabbed his side’s second try of the night. A delicious kick from Costelow sent Tomi Lewis flying down the left wing, and in spite of his offload being deflected, clever poaching from the centre saw him beat the chasing Glasgow defenders to the ball to score. Once again, the fly-half’s conversion split the uprights, giving the hosts a 20-point lead.
Costelow’s kicking game out of hand was becoming a growing trend in the game, and it nearly unlocked the territory for their next score, but despite some smash-and-bash via the likes of Ryan Elias, Fletcher Anderson and Macleod close to the line, a cheap penalty allowed Glasgow an easy reprieve.
The Warriors looked to turn that into points but staunch defence from the hosts forced them into repeated errors and kept them out.
Those defensive efforts quickly paid off for the Scarlets, with the boot of Costelow pushing the lead to over three converted scores heading into the final 15 minutes of the game.
Glasgow had one final throw of the dice to end the game on a high, made easier by Harvey Cuckson’s sin-binning, but further rock-solid defence kept them at bay and enabled the Scarlets to secure their first win of the season.
The teams
Scarlets: 15 Jac Davies, 14 Iori Badham, 13 Macs Page, 12 Eddie James, 11 Tomi Lewis, 10 Sam Costelow, 9 Gareth Davies, 8 Fletcher Anderson, 7 Josh Macleod (c), 6 Max Douglas, 5 Sam Lousi, 4 Jake Ball, 3 Archer Holz, 2 Ryan Elias, 1 Kemsley Mathias
Replacements: 16 Marnus van der Merwe, 17 Sam O’Connor, 18 Henry Thomas, 19 Harvey Cuckson, 20 Dan Davis, 21 Dane Blacker, 22 Carwyn Leggatt-Jones, 23 Gabe McDonald
Glasgow Warriors: 15 Josh McKay, 14 Kyle Rowe, 13 Ollie Smith, 12 Stafford McDowall (c), 11 Kerr Johnston, 10 Dan Lancaster, 9 Ben Afshar, 8 Macenzzie Duncan, 7 Angus Fraser, 6 Gregor Brown, 5 Jare Oguntibeju, 4 Alex Craig, 3 Patrick Schickerling, 2 Johnny Matthews, 1 Jamie Bhatti
Replacements: 16 Gregor Hiddleston, 17 Nathan McBeth, 18 Sam Talakai, 19 Max Williamson, 20 Alex Samuel, 21 Ally Miller, 22 George Horne, 23 Adam Hastings
Referee: Chris Allison (SARU, 5th league game)
Assistant Referees: Ben Whitehouse (WRU), Adam Jones (WRU)
TMO: Morne Ferreira (SARU)
Live on: S4C, Premier Sports, SuperSport, Flo Rugby & URC.tv
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