| The 24 – 7 Warriors victory was shaped by a magical performance from fly-half Loki Crichton, who appeared to orchestrate everything on the night despite the atrocious conditions in Southern France. The ‘magician’ guided the Sixways outfit in continuing the good form they showed in their frustrating loss at Newcastle and guaranteeing them a vital home draw in the last eight of the competition.
Warriors put in another calm and measured performance and apart from one lapse in defence late in the first half, Montauban rarely looked like threatening.
All had expected a tough encounter from the resilient French side but it didn’t happen as time and time again Warriors denied them any decent possession and pinned the home side back. After a string of great performances in Europe, Warriors are now just three wins away from a momentous Heineken Cup place.
“We knew what style of rugby the French were going to play and we came here expecting a tough game. Conditions out there weren’t great so I was very pleased with the way in which we controlled play and scored four decent tries. We let our concentration go late on in the first half and we’re disappointed that they got a try, but overall I think that was a decent performance,” commented Mike Ruddock, Warriors Director of Rugby.
The predicted Montauban onslaught, just didn’t happen as Warriors forced them to give three penalties away in the opening four minutes. Something or somebody had to give and after repeated pressure it was the home side’s prop Pablo Lemoine who crumbled first. His fifteenth minute sin-binning opened the door for Worcester, and prop Darren Morris opened the scoring as he touched down from a rolling maul off a penalty line-out. Loki Crichton converted and then five minutes later Pat Sanderson made it two as he slammed down the Montauban captain Sebastien Fauque’s attempted clearance, kicked ahead and dived on the ball.
The best was yet to come from Warriors though. On 37 minutes Crichton spotted a gap and landed a perfectly weighted kick into the in-goal area, for speedster Benjamin to outpace all the opposition and cross the white wash. Worcester let the third try go to their heads for a moment though, the defence slipped and former Warriors centre Miguel Avramovich pounced to put Sylvain Jonnet in under the posts. Montauban captain, Sebastien Fauque completed the conversion to make it 07-17 at half time.
In the second half Worcester dished out more of the same and it was no surprise when replacement stand-in hooker Matt Mullan scored Warriors fourth try and secured the crucial bonus point on 67 minutes.
Unfortunately the final fifteen minutes descended into farce as Warriors young flanker Tom Wood and replacement Montauban prop Patrick Blanco were both picked out and sin-binned after a mass brawl. But that didn’t change what was a calculated and convincing performance from a strong Warriors line-up.
(Special thanks to Nicola Goodwin - BBC Hereford & Worcester Radio)
|
