Northern Edition

Select Edition

Northern Northern
Southern Southern
Global Global
New Zealand New Zealand
France France

Harlequins heap more misery on Handre Pollard's Leicester Tigers

By PA
Dejected Leicester Tigers players - PA

Dino Lamb’s try gave Harlequins their fourth straight Gallagher Premiership victory as they ran out 29-25 winners at surprise early-season strugglers Leicester.

ADVERTISEMENT

In a slugfest where the lead changed hands six times, Freddie Steward scored twice for Leicester on his return to domestic action following the Rugby World Cup, but this was not enough to prevent a fourth loss in five games for his club.

In contrast, Quins are top of the table for 24 hours at least ahead of their meeting with champions Saracens next Saturday after outscoring their hosts by five tries to three.

Video Spacer

Stormers head coach John Dobson on the challenge of facing Benetton in Treviso

Video Spacer

Stormers head coach John Dobson on the challenge of facing Benetton in Treviso

There was one late change for Leicester, where openside Tommy Reffell dropped out in favour of Matt Rogerson, with youngster Emeka Ilione stepping up to the bench.

It took just four minutes for Harlequins to open the scoring when, after a succession of carries towards the Leicester line, skipper Alex Dombrandt was able to force his way over it.

Marcus Smith hit an upright with the conversion, meaning the gap was soon down to 5-3 when returning World Cup winner Handre Pollard knocked over a penalty for the Tigers.

Quins then had their second try in the 16th minute when Italy international Lamb was helped over the line by a couple of team-mates from a few metres out, Smith this time converting.

ADVERTISEMENT

Leicester quickly hit back again, though, when some slick handling from Cameron Henderson, Ben Youngs and Mike Brown led to captain Hanro Liebenberg finishing superbly in the corner down the left.

The Tigers then went ahead for the first time with 33 minutes played when a strong attacking scrum led to Youngs feeding Pollard, whose pass gave Steward a walk-in on the right wing.

Pollard added the extras, but Harlequins went into the break 17-15 in front thanks to a spectacular diving finish from right winger Tyrone Green off the final play of the first half.

Freddie Steward Leicester Tigers
Freddie Steward scores – PA
ADVERTISEMENT

The lead changed hands again seven minutes after the restart when Brown timed his pass to allow Steward to score his second, despite him hobbling around the right wing moments before, with Pollard converting again.

Back came Quins as they scored their bonus-point try when scrum-half Will Porter broke through Ollie Chessum’s attempted tackle to go clear under the posts, with Smith’s conversion putting the visitors 24-22 ahead.

After replacement prop James Cronin knocked on close to the line, Pollard was able to nudge the Tigers ahead by one point with a penalty from in front of the posts in the 66th minute.

The pendulum then swung for one final time with 10 minutes remaining when, following a quickly taken penalty, Lamb was able to burrow his way over from close range for his second of a barnstorming afternoon.

Related

ADVERTISEMENT

LIVE

{{item.title}}

Trending on RugbyPass

Comments

0 Comments
Be the first to comment...

Join free and tell us what you really think!

Sign up for free
ADVERTISEMENT

Latest Features

Comments on RugbyPass

f
fl 11 minutes ago
‘The problem with this year’s Champions Cup? Too many English clubs’

"fl's idea, if I can speak for him to speed things up, was for it to be semifinalists first, Champions Cup (any that somehow didn't make a league semi), then Challenge's semi finalists (which would most certainly have been outside their league semi's you'd think), then perhaps the quarter finalists of each in the same manner. I don't think he was suggesting whoever next performed best in Europe but didn't make those knockouts (like those round of 16 losers), I doubt that would ever happen."


That's not quite my idea.

For a 20 team champions cup I'd have 4 teams qualify from the previous years champions cup, and 4 from the previous years challenge cup. For a 16 team champions cup I'd have 3 teams qualify from the previous years champions cup, and 1 from the previous years challenge cup.


"The problem I mainly saw with his idea (much the same as you see, that league finish is a better indicator) is that you could have one of the best candidates lose in the quarters to the eventual champions, and so miss out for someone who got an easier ride, and also finished lower in the league, perhaps in their own league, and who you beat everytime."

If teams get a tough draw in the challenge cup quarters, they should have won more pool games and so got better seeding. My system is less about finding the best teams, and more about finding the teams who perform at the highest level in european competition.

50 Go to comments
f
fl 48 minutes ago
‘The problem with this year’s Champions Cup? Too many English clubs’

"Would I'd be think"

Would I'd be think.


"Well that's one starting point for an error in your reasoning. Do you think that in regards to who should have a say in how it's setup in the future as well? Ie you would care what they think or what might be more fair for their teams (not saying your model doesn't allow them a chance)?"

Did you even read what you're replying to? I wasn't arguing for excluding south africa, I was pointing out that the idea of quantifying someone's fractional share of european rugby is entirely nonsensical. You're the one who was trying to do that.


"Yes, I was thinking about an automatic qualifier for a tier 2 side"

What proportion of european rugby are they though? Got to make sure those fractions match up! 😂


"Ultimately what I think would be better for t2 leagues would be a third comp underneath the top two tournemnts where they play a fair chunk of games, like double those two. So half a dozen euro teams along with the 2 SA and bottom bunch of premiership and top14, some Championship and div 2 sides thrown in."

I don't know if Championship sides want to be commuting to Georgia every other week.


"my thought was just to create a middle ground now which can sustain it until that time has come, were I thought yours is more likely to result in the constant change/manipulation it has been victim to"

a middle ground between the current system and a much worse system?

50 Go to comments
f
fl 1 hour ago
‘The problem with this year’s Champions Cup? Too many English clubs’

"Huh? You mean last in their (4 team) pools/regions? My idea was 6/5/4, 6 the max, for guarenteed spots, with a 20 team comp max, so upto 5 WCs (which you'd make/or would be theoretically impossible to go to one league (they'd likely be solely for its participants, say 'Wales', rather than URC specifically. Preferrably). I gave 3 WC ideas for a 18 team comp, so the max URC could have (with a member union or club/team, winning all of the 6N, and Champions and Challenge Cup) would be 9."


That's a lot of words to say that I was right. If (e.g.) Glasgow won the URC and Edinburgh finished 16th, but Scotland won the six nations, Edinburgh would qualify for the Champions Cup under your system.


"And the reason say another URC (for example) member would get the spot over the other team that won the Challenge Cup, would be because they were arguable better if they finished higher in the League."

They would be arguably worse if they didn't win the Challenge Cup.


"It won't diminish desire to win the Challenge Cup, because that team may still be competing for that seed, and if theyre automatic qual anyway, it still might make them treat it more seriously"

This doesn't make sense. Giving more incentives to do well in the Challenge Cup will make people take it more seriously. My system does that and yours doesn't. Under my system, teams will "compete for the seed" by winning the Challenge Cup, under yours they won't. If a team is automatically qualified anyway why on earth would that make them treat it more seriously?


"I'm promoting the idea of a scheme that never needs to be changed again"

So am I. I'm suggesting that places could be allocated according to a UEFA style points sytem, or according to a system where each league gets 1/4 of the spots, and the remaining 1/4 go to the best performing teams from the previous season in european competition.


"Yours will promote outcry as soon as England (or any other participant) fluctates. Were as it's hard to argue about a the basis of an equal share."

Currently there is an equal share, and you are arguing against it. My system would give each side the opportunity to achieve an equal share, but with more places given to sides and leagues that perform well. This wouldn't promote outcry, it would promote teams to take european competition more seriously. Teams that lose out because they did poorly the previous year wouldn't have any grounds to complain, they would be incentivised to try harder this time around.


"This new system should not be based on the assumption of last years results/performances continuing."

That's not the assumption I'm making. I don't think the teams that perform better should be given places in the competition because they will be the best performing teams next year, but because sport should be based on merit, and teams should be rewarded for performing well.


"I'm specifically promoting my idea because I think it will do exactly what you want, increase european rugyb's importance."

how?


"I won't say I've done anything compressive"

Compressive.

50 Go to comments
J
JW 1 hour ago
‘The problem with this year’s Champions Cup? Too many English clubs’

Generally disagree with what? The possibility that they would get whitewashed, or the idea they shouldn't gain access until they're good enough?


I think the first is a fairly irrelevant view, decide on the second and then worry about the first. Personally I'd have had them in a third lvl comp with all the bottom dwellers of the leagues. I liked the idea of those league clubs resting their best players, and so being able to lift their standards in the league, though, so not against the idea that T2 sides go straight into Challenge Cup, but that will be a higher level with smaller comps and I think a bit too much for them (not having followed any of their games/performances mind you).

Because I don't think that having the possibility of a team finishing outside the quarter finals to qualify automatically will be a good idea. I'd rather have a team finishing 5th in their domestic league.

fl's idea, if I can speak for him to speed things up, was for it to be semifinalists first, Champions Cup (any that somehow didn't make a league semi), then Challenge's semi finalists (which would most certainly have been outside their league semi's you'd think), then perhaps the quarter finalists of each in the same manner. I don't think he was suggesting whoever next performed best in Europe but didn't make those knockouts (like those round of 16 losers), I doubt that would ever happen.


The problem I mainly saw with his idea (much the same as you see, that league finish is a better indicator) is that you could have one of the best candidates lose in the quarters to the eventual champions, and so miss out for someone who got an easier ride, and also finished lower in the league, perhaps in their own league, and who you beat everytime.

50 Go to comments
J
JW 1 hour ago
‘The problem with this year’s Champions Cup? Too many English clubs’

Well I was mainly referring to my thinking about the split, which was essentially each /3 rounded up, but reliant on WCs to add buffer.


You may have been going for just a 16 team league ranking cup?


But yes, those were just ideas for how to select WCs, all very arbitrary but I think more interesting in ways than just going down a list (say like fl's) of who is next in line. Indeed in my reply to you I hinted at say the 'URC' WC spot actually being given to the Ireland pool and taken away from the Welsh pool.


It's easy to think that is excluding, and making it even harder on, a poor performing country, but this is all in context of a 18 or 20 team comp where URC (at least to those teams in the URC) got 6 places, which Wales has one side lingering around, and you'd expect should make. Imagine the spice in that 6N game with Italy, or any other of the URC members though! Everyone talks about SA joining the 6N, so not sure it will be a problem, but it would be a fairly minor one imo.


But that's a structure of the leagues were instead of thinking how to get in at the top, I started from the bottom and thought that it best those teams doing qualify for anything. Then I thought the two comps should be identical in structure. So that's were an even split comes in with creating numbers, and the 'UEFA' model you suggest using in some manner, I thought could be used for the WC's (5 in my 20 team comp) instead of those ideas of mine you pointed out.


I see Jones has waded in like his normal self when it comes to SH teams. One thing I really like about his idea is the name change to the two competitions, to Cup and Shield. Oh, and home and away matches.

50 Go to comments
TRENDING
TRENDING Henry Arundell lined up for early England homecoming Henry Arundell lined up for early England homecoming
Search