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James Stokes double sets up London Irish win
By PA
James Stokes scored two tries as London Irish regained first place in their European Challenge Cup pool with a 26-17 bonus point victory over Pau.
Stokes twice benefited from well-timed passed from Paddy Jackson and Phil Cokanasiga scored a superb solo try as Irish established a 21-7 lead at half-time.
Pau, who had briefly levelled through Atila Septar, reduced the gap through a Clovid Lebail penalty but Tom Parton raced into the corner to secure the bonus point after 49 minutes.
The visitors were far from finished and began to put Irish under intense pressure, forcing a number of penalties before Thibault Debaes deservedly crossed the line late on.
Irish have maximum points from their first two matches in the pool following their opening 34-8 win in Agen.
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Latest Comments
Steve Borthwick appointment was misguided based on two flawed premises.
1. An overblown sense of the quality of the premiership rugby. The gap between the Premiership and Test rugby is enormous
2. England needed an English coach who understood English Rugby and it's traditional strengths.
SB won the premiership and was an England forward and did a great job with the Japanese forwards but neither of those qualify you as a tier 1 test manager.
Maybe Felix Jones and Aled Walter's departures are down to the fact that SB is a details man, which work at club level but at test level you need the manager to manage and let the coaches get on and do what they are employed for.
SB criticism of players is straight out of Eddie Jones playbook but his loyalty to keeping out of form players borne out of his perceived sense of betrayal as a player.
In all it doesn't stack up as the qualities needed to be a modern Test coach /Manager
Go to commentsBut still Australians. Only Australia can help itself seems to be the key message.
Blaming Kiwis is deflecting from the actual problem.
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