Lions hit the sweet spot with URC win over Scarlets

The Lions finally hit the sweet spot in this seasons United Rugby Championship (URC) as they battled to a stunning 24-23 win over Scarlets at the Parc Y Scarlets in Llanelli, Wales over the past weekend.

It was the Lions first win in four attempts, after starting their season with three straight defeats, and they also upset the hosts who had started making their stadium a bit of a fortress with five straight wins at the ground before the visitors broke that run.

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Lions captain Marius Louw admitted it was a difficult fixture, but that his side didn’t help themselves with some lacklustre defence that saw them trailing 10-7 at halftime and then 23-14 after 68 minutes before a brilliant late show stole the win.

“We knew how tough it was going to be to come play here. They haven’t lost in about 52 weeks at home. So it was very tough, they proved it in that first half. They played really good rugby and I think our defence wasn’t good enough but we fixed that,” explained Louw after the match.

“We put them under a lot more pressure (in the second half). I think our kicking game was good and it just came down to execution and small margins. At the end of the game we knew we had to be brave and we took our chance.”

The Lions previous three defeats against the Stormers by two points, Edinburgh by one point and Benetton by five points, were all tight with them right in the game until the last minute.

Confidence boost

So this win will be a big confidence booster for the side as they head into their final match of their four week European tour against Ulster in Ireland on Friday night.

“We have had some narrow losses, but we knew that we can play the way we want to. We just have make sure that we execute what we do,” said Louw.

“The way we play we are going to make errors, but it’s about making sure we back each other up, have positive talk on the field and I think this week we handled that correctly. So it is very positive for us to go forward into the Ulster game after this win.”

One of the Lions stars on the night was man-of-the-match Sanele Nohamba, who despite being primarily a scrumhalf, was switched to flyhalf for the match and put in a superb showing, contributing nine points with the boot through three conversions and a penalty.

“It’s been a tough three weeks. But we take it week by week and just focus on one game at a time. So we have been focusing on what we have to do to put ourselves into the right positions to win the game and finally it happened tonight,” said Nohamba.

“I am just happy to be on the field. I want to try help as much as I can and contribute to the team. This week it was at 10 and I am happy to take that role, drive the boys forward and take more ownership of myself in steering the team.”