Worcester Warriors thrash Enisei-STM in European Challenge Cup opener
Worcester started their European Challenge Cup campaign by running in nine tries in a 57-14 rout of Russian club Enisei-STM.
Fly-half Jamie Shillcock grabbed a hat-trick of tries and kicked six conversions as the Premiership club made a flying start to their Pool One campaign in Krasnoyarsk.
Richard Palframan, Nick David, Shillcock, Jono Kitto and Joe Morris all scored first-half tries as the Worcester led 31-0 at the break.
Justin Clegg added another before Shillcock scored two tries in the space of nine minutes to complete his hat-trick, while the try-scoring was completed by Gareth Simpson late on.
Forwards Uldis Saulite and Dmitrii Krotov touched down for the hosts in the second half.
Edinburgh also started their campaign with a bonus-point win on the road as they beat Agen 31-10 in Pool Three.
George Taylor’s first-half brace and a Damien Hoyland try – all three converted by Simon Hickey – saw Edinburgh make a fine response to Thomas Vincent’s early penalty for the French side.
Masilevu scored a try for Agen in the 56th minute but hooker Cameron Fenton sealed Edinburgh’s bonus-point score in the last minute.
Elsewhere on the opening night of the competition, replacement Anthony Etrillard’s 75th-minute try rounded off a 20-13 win for Toulon at fellow Top 14 side Bayonne.
The visitors outscored Bayonne four tries to one in the Pool Two clash but they failed to land any conversions.
Marcel Van Der Merwe’s first-half brace put them 10-6 up at the interval but Peyo Muscarditz’s converted try gave the hosts the advantage early in the second.
Julian Savea touched down to give Toulon a two-point lead before Etrillard crossed against his former club.
In another all-French clash, Brive ran out 27-11 winners at Stade Francais in Pool Four.
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Nah, that just needs some more variation. Chip kicks, grubber stabs, all those. Will Jordan showed a pretty good reason why the rush was bad for his link up with BB.
If you have an overlap on a rush defense, they naturally cover out and out and leave a huge gap near the ruck.
It also helps if both teams play the same rules. ARs set the offside line 1m past where the last mans feet were😅
Go to commentsYeah nar, should work for sure. I was just asking why would you do it that way?
It could be achieved by outsourcing all your IP and players to New Zealand, Japan, and America, with a big Super competition between those countries raking it in with all of Australia's best talent to help them at a club level. When there is enough of a following and players coming through internally, and from other international countries (starting out like Australia/without a pro scene), for these high profile clubs to compete without a heavy australian base, then RA could use all the money they'd saved over the decades to turn things around at home and fund 4 super sides of their own that would be good enough to compete.
That sounds like a great model to reset the game in Aus. Take a couple of decades to invest in youth and community networks before trying to become professional again. I just suggest most aussies would be a bit more optimistic they can make it work without the two decades without any pro club rugby bit.
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