1
Agonising loss for Edinburgh as Immelman wide with last-gasp kick
By PA
Henry Immelman sent a last-gasp penalty wide as Edinburgh suffered an agonising 33-31 defeat in their United Rugby Championship clash against the Bulls in Pretoria. With Darcy Graham scoring a hat-trick, the Scottish side had fought back from an early 15-0 deficit to lead 31-30 with 10 minutes remaining at Loftus Versfeld.
A Morne Steyn penalty in the last minute gave the hosts the advantage once again, but Edinburgh were to get one last chance after a dangerous tackle by Stravino Jacobs on Mark Bennett. Immelman was unable to take advantage from distance with what proved the final kick of the game.
Edinburgh started brightly, but Henry Pyrgos and Immelman both failed with drop goal attempts inside the opening two minutes and the Bulls went ahead with a Chris Smith penalty. Ill-discipline cost Edinburgh early on and Grant Gilchrist had a spell in the sin-bin. Short-range tries from Johan Grobbelaar and Elrich Louw then gave the Bulls a healthy advantage.
Edinburgh responded as James Lang made a break down the left and the ball was worked further wide for Charlie Savala to touch down. Bennett nailed a touchline conversion and further Edinburgh pressure paid off as Graham hit the ball at pace and arced around the defence for his first try. With Bennett again adding the extras, Edinburgh trailed just 15-14 at the interval.
The Bulls started the second period strongly and extended their advantage when Cornal Hendricks raced over out wide for another Smith-converted try after Ruan Nortje had been held up. Edinburgh pulled another try back in fortuitous circumstances after a Bennett penalty attempt struck the upright. Graham was the first to react to the rebound and pounced for his second try.
A Smith penalty gave the Bulls more breathing space, but Graham cut the gap back to one again as he sped over after brilliant handling by Bill Mata and Immelman. Edinburgh began to sense their chance, but the Bulls broke out after a long spell under pressure, with Jacobs stretching out to score. Yet again Edinburgh were not finished and a slick move created the opening for Damien Hoyland to score.
With Bennett converting, the visitors led for the first time. Immelman missed a penalty chance to extend the lead, but Steyn made no mistake when he got the chance after an infringement at a maul. The drama was not over, but Immelman could not punish Jacobs for his high shot on Bennett.
Trending on RugbyPass
2
South Africa vs England player ratings | 2024 Autumn Nations Series
3
Ireland player ratings vs Argentina | 2024 Autumn Nations Series
4
Jake White: As England coach, I’d have been livid
5
Latest Comments
Yeah nar I pretty much agree with that sentiment, wasn't just about the lineout though.
Yeah, I think it's the future of SR, even TRC. Graham above just now posting about how good a night it was with a dbl header of ENGvSA and NZvFrance, and now I don't want to kick SA or Argentina out of TRC but it would be great if in this next of the woods 2 more top teams could come in to create more of these sort of nights (for rugby's appeal). Often Arg and SA and both travel here and you get those games but more often doesn't work out right.
Obviously a long way off but USA and Japan are the obvious two. First thing we need to do is get Eddie Jones kicked out of Japan so they can start improving again and then get a couple of US teams in SRP (even if one its just a US based and augmented Jaguares).
It will start off the whole conferences are crap debate again (which I will continue to argue vehemently against), but imagine a 6 team Pacific conference, Tokyo Sunwolves (drafted from Tokyo JRLO teams), Tokyo All Stars (made up of best remaining foreign players and overseas drafts), ALL Nihon (best of local non Tokyo based talent, inc China/Korea etc, with mainland Japan), a could of West Coast american franchises and perhaps a second self PI driven Hawai'i based team, or Jagaures. So I see a short NFL like 3 or 4 month comp as fitting best, maybe not even a full round, NZvAUSvPAC, all games taking place within a 6hr window. Model for NZ will definitely still require a competitive and funded NPC!
On the Crusaders, I liked last years ending with Grace on the bench (ovbiously form dependent but thats how it ended) and Lio-Willie at 8. I could have Blackadder trying to be a 7 but think balance will be used with him at 6 and Kellow as 7. Scott Barrett is an international 6 sized player. It is just NZ style/model that pushes him into the tight, I reckon he'd be a great loose player, and saders have Strange and Cahill as bigger players (plus that change could draw someone like Darry back). Same with Haig now, hes not grown yet but Barrett hight and been playing 6, now that the Highlanders have only chosen two locks he'll be playing lock, and that is going to change his growth trajectory massively, rather than seeing him grow like an International 6.
Go to commentsDan Carter is the leading points scorer and leading points per game person for a player with significant tests. 2s RWC winner and member of the games greatest ever team. It's not even close. The only question of GOAT for rugby is whether McCaw deserves it given Carter's numbers.
Go to comments