PREMIERSHIP CHAMPIONS Harlequins will not retain their title after going down 33-16 in today’s semi-final clash with Leicester.
The Tigers advance to their ninth consecutive Premiership final thanks to tries from Ireland’s Niall Morris, Matthew Tait, Niki Goneva and Tom Croft (whose romp to the line you can see below).
Conor O’Shea will be disappointed with a costly opening 40 minutes which ended with a turnover and Goneva’s try which gave Tigers a 13-9 half time advantage in Welford Road.
Morris effectively ended the game as a contest with his try on the hour with Danny Care in the sin-bin. Croft and Tait completed the rout by the 71st minute.
Aside from 11 points from the boot of Nick Evans, ‘Quins only riposte was Ross Chisholme’s 76th minute try.
Leicester, in coach Matt O’Connor’s final game before moving to Leinster, will face the winners of Northampton v Saracens in the final on 25 May.
YouTube credit: weskimaster
In the Top 14, meanwhile. South African scrum-half Rory Kockott kicked 17 points as Castres beat Montpellier 25-12 to reach the French Top 14 semi-finals on Saturday.
Kockott, the second highest points scorer in the competition this season behind Toulon’s former England star Jonny Wilkinson, succeeded with five penalties and one conversion.
Castres will now face Clermont on May 25 for a place in the final with Toulon tackling defending champions Toulouse who beat Racing Metro 33-19 on Friday.
Saturday’s result meant that Castres extended the season for joint-coaches Laurent Labit and Laurent Travers who will take charge of Racing next season.
With the sides level at 9-9 at the interval, Castres put daylight between themselves and Montpellier in the 47th minute when back-row forward Antonie Claassen scored the game’s only try.
Remi Tales also knocked over a 35-metre drop goal to put Castres into a second semi-final in three years.
Benoit Paillaugue kicked all of Montpellier’s points.
His team’s afternoon went from bad to worse when lock forward Mamuka Gorgodze was red-carded 10 minutes from the end for stamping.
Additional reporting - © AFP, 2013
