Jack Dempsey scored the first point in a very fast beginning and Glasgow Warriors won 31-21 against Lions. This victory allowed them to make history as they entered their first semi-final of the European Challenge Cup. Glasgow got 4 tries from Dempsey, Dobie, Z Fagerson, and Jordan with Horne making 4 conversions and 1 penalty kick. The Lions earned 3 tries from Nohamba, Horn, Brandon which got converted by Nohamba and Lombard twice.
Sanele Nohamba managed to cut the amount of point Glasgow had by half after halftime. But then Zander Fagerson put the 14-point lead back again. Lions got their point back through Francke Horn, but George Horne gave them another penalty and Tom Jordan scored a try that gave Glasgow some breathing space before Morne Brandon got his score. The semi-final will take place on the last weekend in April.
Glasgow started strong and were doing a great job, showing lots of energy. Unfortunately, Lions’ wing Rabz Maxwane had to leave the game after just seven minutes due to an injury caused by a collision between Matt Fagerson and him, he was taken away on a stretcher.
The Glasgow team made a great play which worked really well. It started with Richie Gray throwing the ball off the top, and Rory Darge and Horne passed it to Sione Tuipulotu. After that, Tuipulotu pivoted and passed it to Dempsey, who scored a try. The play happened very quickly, showing some impressive skill. After this, the Lions lost another player as Ruan Venter had to leave the match.
Right after the other guy left, Glasgow kept scoring points quickly. The players had incredibly fast hands as Ollie Smith passed to Dobie and scored another point. Just like he did with Dempsey’s goal earlier, Horne kicked the conversion over and this put the Warriors ahead 14-0 – it was super easy!
The Lions were having the upper hand for much of the game, and in the second period they had an even better advantage. Asenathi Ntlabakanye was the star of their team with a whopping 22 carries. They had many chances to beat Glasgow’s defense but couldn’t do it, despite having line-outs, scrums and a tap penalty inside their competitors’ 22.
Glasgow’s defense was strong and their line-out started to crumble. They dropped a lot of balls during line-outs and when they caught them, the ball often wasn’t handled cleanly. Gray caused them a lot of trouble. Glasgow held their ground which frustrated the visitors so much that they weren’t able to score before the end of the first half.
After the game restarted, Glasgow tried really hard to protect their own field. However, Nohamba took advantage of a penalty in front of the 22 yards area and ran all the way to the goal post scoring a try that reminded the hosts this wasn’t going to be as easy as they thought it would be.
People from Glasgow had tense moments, because they knew how strong the Lions can be when they are full of energy.
In their last match in the round of sixteen with Racing, the Lions were ahead by 15-7 when a player was given a red card. Despite this setback, the Lions won 51-28 even though they had less players than usual.
Glasgow was having a mini-comeback when Gray stole the ball from the Lions in their own half of the field. This created an opportunity for Zander Fagerson who eventually scored and made it a 14 point lead. Then, Horn scored another try which narrowed the gap to 7 points and this created some worry at Scotstoun Stadium.
The Glasgow Horne scored a penalty to increase the gap to 10 and everyone was relieved when Huw Jones moved the ball through, connected with Smith, who set up Jordan. The Horne made sure of the goal by kicking it over and there was still another try from the Lions near the end, but Glasgow kept their lead.
This result means that they are going to their first European semi-final match against Scarlets in Llanelli which will be one of the most important games in their history.
“Rallying to The End
The Glasgow head coach Franco Smith said, “We didn’t have the ball much and seemed to be a bit nervous on offense. Everyone put in a lot of effort for this game and luckily, it paid off! Scarlets are doing really well right now so we’re gonna take it game by game from here.”
For Glasgow, Smith started the game. Steyn, Jones, Tuipulotu, and Dobie were all part of the team. Miotti and Horne also played while Bhatti, Turner and Z Fagerson formed an attacking trio with Cummings and Gray as their teammates. M Fagerson and Darge were both present as well as Dempsey. Matthews, McBeth, Berghan, Du Preez, Bean, Gordon, Price and Jordan were their replacements.
The Lions squad was made up of Horn in goal. Maxwane, Rass and Louw completed the defensive line along with Van der Merwe while Lombard played with Nohamba on the midfield. Smith joined Botha upfront alongside Ntlabakanye and Alberts who had Schoeman; Kriel; Venter; and Horn supplying from behind them. Brandon, Rijnsburger (third reserve goalkeeper), Dreyer (third defender) Delport (first midfielder substitute), Gordon (second midfielder substitute) Van den Berg (fourth forward); Jonker (fifth forward); Coetzee; closed out this contingent of replacements for The Lions team.
