Exeter Chiefs blew the chance to go top of the Aviva Premiership table after suffering their second dispiriting defeat in seven days. In a tight contest that remained scoreless until the second half Chiefs again failed to take crucial opportunities and allowed Gloucester to keep alive their own faint hopes of European qualification next season.
There were clear echoes of Exeter’s defeat by Wasps in the Champions Cup quarter-final as the visitors squandered at least three clear chances, the most glaring when James Short unaccountably fumbled the ball when in space and heading for the Gloucester line. The outcome now threatens their prospects of a home semi-final draw in next month’s Premiership play-offs.
A final-quarter yellow card for the England wing Jack Nowell also undermined Exeter’s challenge, as did the nerveless goalkicking of Greig Laidlaw. The Scotland captain landed three penalties and also slotted the conversion of the game’s only try from the wing Ollie Thorley on his league debut. The 19-year-old Thorley was drafted in only after Mark Atkinson was declared unfit while Billy Twelvetrees was playing despite a pre-match bout of food poisoning.
Gareth Steenson kicked all Exeter’s points but his side will need to bounce back quickly if they wish to revive their title push. A grateful Gloucester, stung by a grim home defeat by Newport Gwent Dragons the previous week, defended stoutly and left the Chiefs’ director of rugby, Rob Baxter, bemoaning his side’s lack of composure. “We were massively undone by a period of ill-discipline in the final quarter,” said Baxter, whose team will now have to rely on Leicester beating Northampton to guarantee a play-off spot this weekend. “I don’t want to give the players the excuse that we were involved in a big game last week.”
With England’s assistant coaches Steve Borthwick and Paul Gustard both on the lookout for potential candidates for the summer tour to Australia, it proved a better night for Ben Morgan and Matt Kvesic than Exeter wannabes such as Henry Slade, Luke Cowan-Dickie, Don Armand, Dave Ewers and Mitch Lees.
Rare is the Exeter fixture that involves a pointless first half but, on a damp evening, this was not the type of free-running contest they now relish and Gloucester’s defensive line speed reflected the dismay of all concerned following the Dragons debacle. Neither side could generate any sustained momentum and the most promising Chiefs attacks ended with first Cowan-Dickie and then Olly Woodburn spilling the greasy ball as they surged towards the line. Apart from the claustrophobic breakdown duel between Kvesic and Julian Salvi, both proteges of the Gloucester coach Laurie Fisher,and the energy of Gloucester’s full-back Tom Marshall, it was very much a case of blankety-blank.
It was the first scoreless opening half in the Premiership since 2010 and the first at Kingsholm since 2004. Further scrabbling back through the record-books, however, was rendered irrelevant almost as soon as the teams had reappeared. Steenson popped over a drought-breaking penalty before Gloucester, on the back of a midfield break by the busy Morgan, worked Thorley over in the left corner. The former Cheltenham College student has represented England U20s and made his first-team debut in 2013 at the age of 17, making him the youngest Gloucester player in the professional era.
Exeter responded with a second long-range Steenson penalty and, with conditions clearing, a more rousing contest ensued. Chiefs had to soldier on without both Geoff Parling and Lachie Turner, both first-half casualties, but Gloucester were grateful to Kvesic, among others, for a couple of key turnovers in their own half. After Laidlaw and Steenson had exchanged further penalties, the hosts were boosted by the 68th-minute sin-binning of Nowell for a tip-tackle on Thorley. Laidlaw slotted the resultant angled penalty to secure the first result of the Premiership’s Restart Rugby weekend, which aims to support players whose careers are ended through illness or injury.
Gloucester Marshall; Cook, Trinder, Twelvetrees, Thorley; Hook, Laidlaw (capt); Thomas (Wood, 57), Hibbard (Dawidiuk, 62), Afoa (Doran-Jones, 56), Savage, Thrush, Moriarty, Kvesic, Morgan.
Try Thorley. Con Laidlaw. Pens Laidlaw 3.
Exeter Turner (Short, h-t); Nowell, Slade, Whitten (Campagnaro, 69), Woodburn; Steenson (capt), Chudley; Moon (Hepburn, 69), Cowan-Dickie (Yeandle, 57), Williams, Lees, Parling (Welch, 33), Armand, Salvi, Waldrom (Ewers, 62).
Pens Steenson 3.
Sin-bin Nowell 68.
Referee C Maxwell-Keyes (RFU). Att 13,390.
