Scarlets starlets give Bath harsh lesson in finishing power
THE Scarlets have now won seven of their last eight games in all competitions and simply blew Bath out of the water with a brilliant second half display that earned them the famous rag doll for which the teams compete.
Inspirational skipper Emyr Phillips claimed two driving lineout tries to guide his side out of touch and Jack Condy struck in the final minute to complete what ended up as a rout in the end. It was a defeat that left Bath director of rugby Todd Blackadder scratching his head in disbelief.
“We are better than that, I haven’t seen that before – it was unbecoming of the season we have had so far. I was really disappointed, especially with that last 20 minutes,” admitted Blackadder.
“Our pride has been
dented and it will galvanise us. It looked like we had the game in control, but we didn’t win those collisions in the second half and credit to the Scarlets they played really well with a young side.”
Prop Max Lahiff, hooker Tom Dunn and tricky wing Jeff Williams all crossed for tries that ex-Scarlets No.10 Rhys Priestland converted for a 21-9 interval lead. But that was as good as it got for them as they failed to add to their tally in the second half.
To make matters worse for Bath they lost Priestland to the sin-bin as his former team mates grew in confidence. Josh Macleod and Tom Phillips crossed for tries that Dan Jones converted to give the Scarlets the lead just after the hour and from then on they dominated proceedings.
Emyr Phillips edged his way over for his brace and then Condy added a fifth of the night to crown a brilliant second half. Jones ended up with 17 points and Billy McBryde added a fifth conversion after coming on for 17-year-old debutant wing Ryan Conbeer.
“Momentum swung our way and we took advantage of it,” said Scarlets coach Ioan Cunningham. “Full credit to the players, what we spoke about at half time was to stick to what we put in place, not to panic and chase the game and I think it showed in the last half hour, it came together for us.
“We felt that if this young group of players could get a win over a quality side like Bath it would be great for us as a region. There were a lot of individual players who stood up and who will give us selection headaches moving forward.”