Cardiff ride out Lee-Lo red to claim derby spoils
DAI Young hailed his Cardiff side’s forward power after the Blue and Blacks claimed an entertaining Welsh derby win over the Dragons despite losing centre Rey LeeLo to a red card in the second half.
Both teams were without their Wales internationals who are preparing for Saturday’s autumn Test opener with New Zealand – it robbed Cardiff of ten players and Dragons six.
And although the home side were actually outscored by four tries to three, their scrum dominance helped ensure they came out on top with tries from Lloyd Williams, Hallam Amos and a penalty score.
Dragons scored tries through Taylor Davies, Mesake Doge, Rio Dyer and Joe Maksymiw, and while they were dangerous in the first quarter, they couldn’t maintain that pressure.
“I’m really pleased to win because we made it very difficult for ourselves with a yellow and red card,” said Young. “I thought they were just, but I felt we grew up a little bit as a team.
“We discovered a strength at scrum and lineout and kept on going. In games gone by we would probably have gone away from that, but we found a weakness in the Dragons and exploited it.”
Late efforts from Dyer and Maksymiw ensured Dragons did take two losing bonus points but they would have hoped for more after making a blistering start.
Hooker Davies burrowed over after just three minutes and his namesake Sam improved the try.
Jarrod Evans kicked a Cardiff penalty, but then his half-back partner Williams saw yellow for tackling Jordan Williams high. It allowed Doge to crash over and Sam Davies kicked the extras.
Lloyd Williams returned from the bin to score immediately and Evans converted, but Cardiff lost Max Llewelyn, Corey Domachowski and Jason Harries all to first-half injuries.
A try from Amos after Lloyd Williams kicked ahead nonetheless put Young’s men 18-14 to the good at half-time. It had been a hugely entertaining first 40 despite the lack of Test stars.
Referee Ben Whitehouse awarded Cardiff’s power and their strong lineout drive with a penalty try when the game resumed, but he then dismissed Lee-Lo for a shoulder to the
head of Sam Davies after checking the incident with TMO Sean Brickell.
Sam Davies and Evans swapped penalties before another strike from Evans left Dragons chasing their tail. They did score through Dyer and Maksymiw with an extra man to take something from the game, but it wasn’t enough for victory.
“We came second at scrum time – nobody is going to hide from that and it would be foolish to,” said Dragons director of rugby Dean Ryan.
“The impact that had on the game ultimately gave them space to hide when they went down to 14 men and we couldn’t get out of it.
“When we tried, we weren’t as accurate as we would want to be.
“We know we can threaten sides and you could see how fast we came out, but we also know there are areas of the game that can be vulnerable to us.
“They didn’t want to go fast and we did. They wanted to be in a scrum and we didn’t. It ended up being tight and we came second.”