Connacht started and finished strongly to beat Benetton in a 38-30 bonus-point victory in a topsy-turvy BKT United Rugby Championship clash.
Connacht started and finished strongly to beat Benetton in a 38-30 bonus-point victory in a topsy-turvy BKT United Rugby Championship clash.
England flew out of South Africa last Saturday evening to Heathrow as the rightful champions, the consistency of their potent scrum and manipulative defence helping them to a deserved first title since 2016.
They also confirmed that skipper Evan O’Connell, the nephew of Paul O'Connell who last took the field in the July 4 pool win over Georgia, has been ruled out for the remainder of the tournament through injury.
The Irish looked set to be beaten as they had surrendered an early 12-0 lead and were trailing 15-16 and were fortunate not to be 15-22 behind as the Eastern Europeans missed a pair of kickable penalties when tensing up coming down the finishing straight.
The Irish looked set to be beaten as they had surrendered an early 12-0 lead and were trailing 15-16 and were fortunate not to be 15-22 behind as the Eastern Europeans missed a pair of kickable penalties when tensing up coming down the finishing straight.
The Irish were impressive 55-15 opening day winners over Italy last Saturday at DHL Stadium and Willie Faloon has now changed four forwards and three backs for Thursday’s clash with Georgia in Stellenbosch.
Australia felt hard done by in their round two loss to Ireland in Paarl because in the aftermath of their 10-30 defeat, Irish back-rower James McNabney was cited and banned for foul play that happened in the 35th minute that was missed by the officials in real time.
Forwards Max Flynn and Mikey Yarr, along with backs Ruben Moloney and Jake O'Riordan are the new names added to the squad that Richie Murphy guided to within a whisker an another U20s Six Nations title.
The Irish kept alive their hopes of securing a third successive Six Nations age-grade title by scoring a clock-in-the-red try to draw 32-all with title rivals England last Friday at The Rec.