The Guardian from London, Greater London, England • 21

SPORTS NEWS 1 21 The Guardian Monday November 18 1996 Rugby Union Heineken European Cup, quarter-finals: Cardiff 22, Bath 19 Brive35, Llanelli 14 Bath's pride takes a mauling Scarlets are caught cold and frozen out BaLaaaalaaBBaaaaBaaaaaaaaBaaafl Moon and his dangerous breaks at the base of the scrum, also worked to perfection and gave the former Wales scrum-half an unusually quiet afternoon. "We were always trying to play from behind the gain-line and we could never get our game going," Evans explained later. Brive, on the other hand, could rely on their pack, which alternated between supplying quick rucked ball to the gifted half-backs Alain Penaud and Philippe Carbon-neau and a series of unstoppable rolling mauls which time after time drove deep into Welsh territory. The French coach Laurent Seigne laid it out later, saying: "For us it was just a matter of sticking to the fundamentals of the game. The first quality of this team is to be able to keep it simple and play at pace." Brive were perhaps lucky to be awarded a try to David Venditti after what appeared to be a gigantic knock-on as he collected an up-and-under in front of the posts, but after penalties for further Welsh infringements the game was all over at 32-7 after 51 minutes.

At least Evans salvaged some pride for the Scarlets by exploiting a tapped penalty near the line to score his second try. "It was a hard physical game and Brive will certainly be a tough prospect when they play Cardiff at home," Evans said. "There was no quarter asked today and none given. But that's what European Cup rugby is all about." SCORERS: Brive: Tries: Labrousse. Venditti.

Penalties! Penaud 3, Lamaison 4. Conversions! Lamaison 2. Ltanellli Tries: Evans 2. Conversions! Botlca 2. Brlvei Viars; Fabre, Lamaison, Venditti, Carrat; A Penaud (capt; Heymans, 76min).

Carbonneau; Casadei, Tarvors IE Bouti, 52). Crespy (A Boudlo. 74), Alegret. Roes. Doml IF Duboisset, 32).

Kacala, Labrousse. Llanelli: Proctor; I Evans (capt), Wintle. Boobyer, Evans; Botlca, Moon; Jones, McBryde. John, Ford, Cooper, Perego, I Jones, Wyalt. Referee: Campsall (England).

Ian Borthwlck In Brive OARED on by the home crowd, Brive set up this ivictory with a display of controlled, pressure rugby that denied Llanelli a touch of the ball for virtually the entire opening quarter. While the Welsh were still coming to terms with the intense atmosphere inside the compact Pare des Sports, Brive shot into the lead with 19 points in as many minutes. "It was like a party out there," said the Llanelli captain Ieuan Evans. "We could hardly hear ourselves think and it took quite a while to get used to the noise." Brive had determined to play full-on rugby right from the start and quickly had the Scarlets under pressure in their own half. Surprised by the technique and mobility of the local pack, Llanelli conceded first a penalty and then a try after only seven minutes when the Brive No.

8 Thierry Labrousse powered over from a scrum under the posts. Repeated Welsh infringements in the rucks and mauls led to three more penalties. "Brive's pack certainly won them the match," said Evans, the outstanding Welshman on the day with two tries to his credit. "Physically they are not very big but they were far more dynamic than us in the first quarter and that made all the difference." That said, when Llanelli picked up the pace they scored with their first back-line movement of the afternoon. Wayne Proctor burst into the line from full-back, splitting the defence, and from the kick-through Evans won the race to cross near the corner flag.

With Brive going off the boil Llanelli pressed hard, but the slippery underfoot conditions and the inability of the Welsh forwards to ensure clean possession made it hard going. Brive's other pre-match plan, to stifle Rupert Dax 18, Toulouse 26 by the flanker Nathan Thomas was not scored until the closing minutes. Once again searching questions were asked of Mike Catt that the Bath and England fly-half struggled to answer. In sharp contrast to Cardiff's Jonathan Davies, who often stretched the Bath defence with astute punting, Catt seemed to have no coherent overview of his basic pivotal duties and instead favoured flashy miss-passes or risky breaks that were quickly smothered. The impression persists that Catt's true position is really inside-centre.

Bath's imminent signing of Steve Atherton, the South African Test lock who will join his Natal team-mate Fe-derico Mendez at the Rec, may be a sound long-term investment but that acquisition does not address the immediate problem of how Bath intend to turn the screw on opponents from behind the scrum. Second-rate sides such as Bristol, who recently conceded 10 tries at the Rec, may have lulled Bath into a false sense of their own attacking capability. Arguably, Hall's decision to leave out his key goalkicker Jonathan Callard left Bath no insurance policy once it became apparent that the Cardiff line was not for crossing. Catt did kick 14 points but crucially he failed with three penalties, any one of which might ultimately have taken the game into extra-time had it gone over. Near the end Ian Sanders's decision to run a penalty looked foolhardy.

Frequent changes in personnel have probably contributed to Bath's loss of cohesion on major occasions, conveying the message that the management believe tactical shortcomings can be remedied by bringing in fresh faces. Hall has created a tricky problem, having assembled a quality squad of around 40 players, most of whom believe they should be first-team regulars. Bath have become a club without a recognisable line-up. Terry Holmes, the Cardiff coach, may have been unduly modest when he said the leading Welsh clubs had proved they could compete on equal terms with their English counterparts. On Saturday Cardiff, with inspirational characters like Jonathan Humphreys and Robert How-ley, looked capable of beating any side in Britain and most of those in France too, Nigel Walker clinching Cardiff Robert Armstrong HHBHE shock-waves of "MBath's exit from the LH Heineken European Cup on the wings of a rousing Cardiff chorus of Bread of Heaven will reverberate throughout England and Wales for months to come.

While unjustly-maligned Leicester continued to fly the flag in Europe, Bath, the standard-bearers of new-age rugby, have been peremptorily despatched along with the vaunted London clubs, Harlequins and Wasps, who also sought to play a dynamic 15-man game in their first season in the competition. According to John Hall, Bath's director of rugby, they will "take stock" of a knockout blow that will cost them up to 500,000 before deciding on measures to achieve consistent results. So far Bath have suffered three defeats in the league in addition to their devastating away-days in Pontypridd and Cardiff. That series of set-backs constitutes a genuine crisis for the club, who in recent memory have never slipped so badly in the early months of the season. Their capacity to play the expansive game they espouse is found wanting each time they face a well organised side like Cardiff, who mix controlled possession with shrewd kicking.

Bath's claim to be "the best club in Europe" had already become an albatross before they came to the Arms Park largely because their game plan looked naive against other elite opponents. Hall admitted his post-mortem will focus strongly on "how we use the crucial aspect of Bath's play that exposed their inability to turn pressure into points. For much of the game Cardiff carefully shepherded the English champions into harmless areas of the field where they found it difficult to unleash their strike-runners, notwithstanding a good supply of ball. Bath's only try SCORERS) Cardiff! Tryi Walker. Conversion: Oavfes.

Penalties: Davies 3, Jarvls 2. Bath: Try: Thomas. Conversion: Call. Ponaltl.ii Catt 4. Cardiff: Thomas (L Jarvls, 61mln); Walker.

Hall. Dauies, Hill; Davles, 1 Howley: A Lewis, Humphreys, Young, Waketord, Jones, Bennett (O Williams. 12), Ringer, Taylor Bath: Robinson; Paul, da Glanville (capt), Guscott, A Adebayo; Can, A Nlcol (I Sanders. 3); Hilton. French.

Ubogu. Haag, Redman, Thomas. Ojomoh. Peters. Referee: Black (Ireland).

Catt winces as Jonathan Davies touch photograph: david jones Shaky Toulouse get it together kicks Bath's ambitions into scoreline a bit more respectable with their late try but, in truth, nothing could soften this massive blow to their pride and reputation. As Leicester 23, Harlequins 1 3 Best laid schemes spiked by Dwyer's joke for the injured Justin Thomas, put the game beyond Bath's reach with two towering penalties in the final 15 minutes. Bath contrived to make the blamed. His strong, incisive running fashioned a try for Will Carling after the break and he and Jim Staples were the pick of the Quins backs. Cockerill decisive try Orrell 3, Gloucester Ian Malln THE northern hemisphere's version of the Super-12 tournament was designed to expand the horizons of Europe's players and expose them to different rugby cultures.

It is ironic, then, that the competition's favourites are now Leicester, as unpretentious and English as a steak and kidney pudding. Toulouse, still smarting from last month's 77-17 pasting at Wasps, will hardly relish a semi-final trip to Welford Road in the depths of an East Midlands January where they will face a pack, described by Harlequins' coaching director Dick Best after this defeat, as the "best in Quins and Wasps have illuminated the tour Jumping for cover Mike semi-final place with a marvellous opportunist try just before the hour, courtesy of a slick pass by Davies. Lee Jarvis, a replacement hamstring. The worry is that Back apparently has a lower-back problem which puts pressure on the hamstring. Back's replacement, the Ireland A player Eric Miller, performed admirably in the second half as the Tigers put the visitors in one of their bear hugs, pinning them down in their own half, disrupting their line-out and slowing down the rhythm of a game which was not decided until the final minute when Rob Liley darted over for the deciding try.

Quins were left to rue missed first-half opportunities when they had the Tigers in a trap. Gary Connolly's loose pass with a two-man overlap wasted a chance to add to Dan Luger's exhilarating eighth-minute score. But Connolly can hardly be two training sessions on Thursday the players had sat down and drawn up a game plan and code of conduct. "They have laid down nine objectives," he said. After the first to stay in League One he realised they sounded so banal he paused, smiled and started on a new thread about "performance The chief executive Duncan Leopold, warming to the gob-bledegook, talked of "collective responsibility.

The players have reacted positively, as you've It was true. Once they stopped fretting to remember the nine objectives, the failure was gallant. The situation remains Irish critical but buoyant. SCORERS) London Irish! Try: Richards. Drop goal: Humphreys.

Penalties: Humphreys 4. Wasps: Trias: Sampson, Roiser. Dallaglio. Conversions! Ulton 2. Penalty: Ulton.

London Irish! O'Shea; Charles, Henderson, Bishop, Woods; Humphreys, Richards; Mooney, Kellum, Halpln (capt), Davidson, O'Kelly, O'Connell, Dawson, Coalollo. Waapai Ulton; Sampson, Qreenatock, Tuigamala, Roiser; A King, A Gomarsall; Molloy. Mitchell, Green, Cronln, A Reed, Dallaglio (capl), White, Sheasby. Hughes (Manchester). Holmes pointed out, Toulouse are the only club who can say they are the best in Europe because they actually won the cup last season.

Rory Underwood. One day he may even have to leave out Welford Road talisman Dean Richards but not yet. Helping churn the Leicester pack through the mud for the rolling maul that propelled Richard Cockerill over the line early in the second half, Deano was once again in his element. "I am pleased that our rolling maul is speeding up," said Dwyer and, once again, he was only half-joking. SCORERS! Leicester: Tries: Cockerill.

Liloy. Conversions: Liley 2. PonaltloB: Liley 3. Harlaquins: Tries: Luger. Carling.

Penalty! Challinor. Leicester! Liley; Hacknoy. Greenwood, Potter. Lloyd (R Underwood. 64min); Ltley.

A Healey; Rountroe. Cockerill. Gartorlh. Johnson, Poolo (R Field. 55).

Wells. Back (E Miller, 33), Richards (capt). Harlequins: Staples, 0 O'Leary. Con nolly, Carling, Luger; Challinor. Harries, Leonard leapt).

Wood. Beno-zoch. Gareth Llewollyn. Glyn Llowollyn. Jenkins.

Cabannos. Davison Referee: Thomas (WRU). his luck Mark Mapletoft was in supreme place-kicking form, with eight successes from nine attempts, and he left Orrell bewildered by his pivotal contribution in a second-half points spree. The home side was so busy trying to keep an eye on the buzzing Gloucester fly-half that defence went neglected. Scott Benton, a perfect scrum-half foil to Mapletoft, breached the Orrell line from a short scrum.

Windo followed him over in a rolling maul in the softening-up process before the sprinters, Lumsden, Peters and Saveri-mutto, with his second score, added the fancy icing to the cake. SCORERS: Orrell! Penalty: Hitchmough. Gloucester: Tries: Savor Imutto 2, Bonton, Windo, Lumsdon, Potors. Conversions: Moplotolt 5. Penalties! Mapletotl 3.

Orrell! Hitchmough; Clayton, Tuigamala. Lyon (capt), Heslop (P Horrocks, h-t); Taborner, Cook; Worsley, Scott, Tumor, Roes. Cusanl, Angolsoa, Wood, Nolson. Olouoesten Catling: Peters, A Savorlmutto, Roberts, A Lumsden; Mapletoft, Benton (L Beck, 68mln); Windo, Greening (C Fortoy, 68), A Deacon, Fldler, Sims (capt), Glanville, Carter, Pearce. Referee! Morrison (Bristol).

fired a pass out to Michel Marfaing who sprinted 30 metres to score unopposed near the posts. The pace and vision of Marfaing, who recently trans-fered from Narbonne, have been among the highlights of the French season to date. But it was a recent arrival at Dax, Ugo Mola, who threatened to create a major upset by giving them their first win over Toulouse in three years. Mola, who joined Dax after three years on the bench at Toulouse, scored two superb tries in the first 25 minutes, helping his fired-up side to go into an 18-6 lead in front of a capacity crowd of 12,000. But Mola's sweet revenge was shortlived as Toulouse forced a penalty try from a scrum shortly before half-time, with Castaignede reducing the margin to two points at the interval with a penalty.

With the No. 8 Sylvain Dis-pagne and the prop Christian Califano figuring strongly the Toulouse pack gradually took hold of the game, but as usual the danger men for Toulouse were their imperious back three of Ntamack, Stephane Ougier and David Berty. SCORERSi Das: Tries: Mola 2. Penaltlee: Dourthe 2. Conversion! Dourthe.

Toulouse. Tries: penalty try, Marfaing. Ponaltlea: Deylaud 2, Castaignede 2. Conversions! Deylaud, Castaignede. Dax: Dourthe; Mola (F Duberger.

45mln), Glordani, Tauzfn, Labeyrio; J-F Dubois, Morlaes; Gouaillard Reboyrotte, 64), Ibanoz (T Rechou, 71), Laperne, Boraud (F Duplelchs, 52). 0 Roumat (capt), Berok, Magna, Pelous. Toulousei Ougier; Ntamack (capt), Marfaing, Castaignede, Berty; Ooylaud, Cazalbou; Calilano, Soula, J-L Jordana, Mlortn. Belot, Lacroix, Sonnes (H Manent. 4B), Dispagne.

Referee; Thomas (France). Ireland's pack Gabriel Fulcher will replace Henry Hurley and Mick Galwey. Tony Russ, only three months into a five-year coaching contract with Ulster, is to become the new director of rugby at the Courage League Two club Waterloo. The former Leicester coach watched Ulster lose 39-26 to the Australians in Belfast. Alan Tait, the former Great Britain rugby league full-back who has been released by Leeds, has joined Rob Andrew's Newcastle.

IRELAND! Staples (Harloqulns): Topping (Ballymona), Bell (Northampton), McCall (Dungannon), Crotty (Garryowen); Burk (Bristol), Hogan (Oxlord University, capl); Popplewell (Newcastle). Wood (Harloqulns), arises (Saracens), Puloher, Davidson (both London Irish), Corkery (Bristol), McBrtde (Malone), A Foley (Shannon). Replacements! Field (Malone), Humphreys (London Irish), Molvor (Garryowen), Johns (Saracens), Hurley (Mosoloy), A Clarke (Northampton). Ian Borthwick TOULOUSE are far from being the slick machine that triumphed in last year's European Cup and the wounds of last month's astonishing defeat by Wasps are still raw to the touch. But nevertheless they managed to show sufficient composure and resilience to head off a spirited challenge from Dax on Saturday.

"Things looked a little shaky there for a while," acknowledged a relieved Thomas Castaignede in the dressing room afterwards. "But this team is a very tight-knit group and we seem to be able to put things together when it really counts." It took nearly an hour in the chilly conditions of Dax for that to happen, but when it did Toulouse showed the same quick reactions, the same flair for counter-attacking and the same ability to capitalise on mistakes that has made them the French champions for the past three years. Dax, as they had on numerous occasions, once again failed to find touch and the Toulouse captain Emile Nta-mack swooped on the ball just outside his 22. The big winger ran straight back at the opposition, sidestepping two tacklers before feeding the second-row Franck Belot at his shoulder. Belot continued the movement and passed to the flanker Didier Lacroix, who in turn found Jerome Cazal- bou.

The scrum-half then Wood back in Ian Malln KEITH WOOD'S dynamic displays in the Harle quins front row this season have earned the hooker a recall to Ireland's side for the Test against Australia in Dublin on Saturday. Ireland give a new cap to the 22-year-old Garryowen left-wing Dominic Crotty. The Cork-born Crotty takes the place of Richard Wallace one of eight changes to the side that lost 40-25 to Western Samoa last Tuesday. Jim Staples is recalled at full-back instead of Simon Mason, Mark McCall takes over from Rob Henderson in the centre, James Topping switches wings and Paul Burke returns at fly-half instead of David Humphreys. In the pack Nick PoppleweLl and 49 Courage League One: London Irish 20, Wasps 22 Wasps wobble to top Hill cannot believe Harlequins, as Best admitted, had their hearts set on this trophy.

"Now we're back to the humdrum of the league, which we really want to win for the first time. But we have expanded our style in this competition and learned a lot about ourselves." Dwyer said: "I don't think we're too far off the quality of the bottom teams in the Super-12. I don't know why the RFU doesn't stop selling divisional rugby. This European competition will improve the quality of the Five Nations and it's forcing up the level of players. Even after the Leinster match the players were saying that it was so much quicker than the style of rugby in the league." Dwyer has made some bold decisions, such as dropping the out-of-sorts Richard Hill, their director of coaching, admitted: "We played awfully in the first half but somehow we turned round 16-0 up, which I couldn't quite believe." Orrell, still without a league point, were victims of their ineptness before the break, by which time the visitors had rid themselves of their tension.

Despite having Gloucester pinned down in their favourite left corner, they made no impression. Line-outs were won but not capitalised upon by the punishing drives that were once Orrell's preserve. In the end, their pack got rolled over. meeting. The RFU believes the Clubs have introduced a fighting fund of 700,000 that will be paid to England players before Christmas to keep the squad locked into clubs before they commit themselves to England contracts.

nament with their expansive style but the Tigers carry the torch for England. After the match Bob Dwyer, Leicester's cerebral Australian coach, joked about fielding Northampton's backs and his forwards in the combined fixture against Western Samoa next month. There was a serious message in the jest. Leicester, for all the virtues of their mighty pack, are still not quite able to play a convincing 15-man game. Dwyer wants to make Leicester less predictable and Neil Back, the explosive flanker who can be the missing link in the evolution of his coach's dream, will play a crucial role.

But Back's homecoming was rudely interrupted after 33 minutes when he left the field clutching an injured with 15 minutes left, he might have been tactically substituted. King, too, faded after a decisive first half. Catt will expect a smoother service. Tuigamala, scourge of Ireland last Tuesday, was the rock on which frenzied endeavour foundered but by the end the Irish looked the club in clover, Wasps the one in crisis. The reverse is true.

The Irish have difficulties of continuity 10 men on national duty last week and cash flow, not to mention publication. The programme stops its results with September. Questioned, a spokeman said dis-armingly: "Ah, well, we've lost all the rest of course." Last week, after much debate and one win in 12 competitive games, the club decided against reducing the win bonus. Instead they cut the match fee from 500 to 100 and engaged Willie Anderson as director of rugby, a new post. The coach Clive Woodward, who approved, will probably continue to look after the backs.

Anderson said that after David Plummer IF LUCK can play its part in a thumping, Gloucester were blessed with good fortune in coming up against woebegone opposition. Orrell are lacking in confidence and organisational ability and with more cherry-and-white shirts among the meagre thousand at a bleak Edge Hall Road on Saturday their supporters appear to accept the club's inexorable slide into League Two. Relegation is less of a threat to Gloucester after a third successive league victory but Jeremy Alexander WASPS moved level with Harlequins at the top of the table looking more sheepish than bullish. Having built a 22-6 lead after 35 minutes with two wide tries and a laughable third by Dallaglio from an Irish line-out, they were pegged back by fiery spirit and tackling that split their cohesion and turned complacency into desperation. The pack stopped taking the ball forward, the halves tried to fling it wider from perceived trouble, and anxiety found the backs caught in possession and out of composure.

De Glanville seemed an astute choice as England captain and Nigel Melville, Wasps' director of rugby, admitted "some minds were switched to next In other days Gomarsall, before his first cap, would have been rested. Now, pressed increasingly -by Richards, who nipped in for an unconverted try to make it 22-20 Twickenham calls crisis meeting TWICKENHAM has called an emergency meeting of the International Board in London tomorrow in an attempt to solve the Rugby Football Union's dispute with its leading clubs. Delegates from around the world will attend the.