Sunday, September 11, 2005

WARRIORS produced a late surge to wear down a spirited London Irish side and claim their first win of the season in the Premiership.

A penalty try two minutes from time and a superb drop goal from new boy Shane Drahm gave Worcester the edge in a closely-contested game that Irish dominated for long periods.

Worcester still had to endure several minutes of intense pressure at the end of the game and, although they had skipper Pat Sanderson sin-binned and gave away a host of penalties, they clung on to what could be a vital victory come May.

It hadn't looked good for much of the game and Irish, buoyed by an opening day triumph against Leeds and a hat-trick of pre-season wins, were hungry for tries in a bid to end the day as surprise Premiership leaders.

Their pursuit of the bonus point that would put them top could ultimately have been what cost the Exiles the match. As soon as Warriors reverted to the power game there was only going to be one winner.

In the first-half, Scott Staniforth was just the right side of the dead ball line on two occasions to put a pair of tries on the board for the hosts.

The first of those came after the ball was fumbled by James Brown on his own '22'. The day did not get any better for Worcester's fly-half and he was replaced by Drahm after straining a knee.

The diminuative Australian missed a straight-forward penalty shortly after being introduced in the 24th minute, but he would later make up for his waywardness.

Sandwiched in between Staniforth's scores came a well-worked Warriors try.

Drew Hickey made a scintillating break and was hauled down close to the line. But the visitors kept possesion of the ball to set up a driving maul which was completed when veteran prop Tony Windo made the line.

This time Drahm made no mistake as he registered his first points for the club with a conversion.

Warriors' joy was short-lived, however. Staniforth again showed a clean pair of heels to the Worcester defence, this time latching on to a punt from Phil Murphy.

Drahm reduced the arrears when he sold a dummy, spun and slotted a drop goal, but Barry Everitt cancelled that effort with a penalty just before half-time to make it 15-10 at the break.

The crucial moment of the match came just after the interval when Kieron Dawson charged over the line. As the home fans were cheering what they thought was a decisive try, referee Martin Fox spotted an infringement and decided to award Worcester a five-metre scrum.

From that moment on, Irish seemed unable to re-gain the momentum -- even when prop Chris Horsman was sin-binned after clashing with Dawson.

The Londoners also went down to 14 men when Delon Armitage was yellow-carded for a body check on Jonny Hylton as the Worcester wing tried a chip-and-chase down the right wing.

But Worcester turned once again to their forwards to make the all-important breakthrough.

With a scrum just yards from the try-line, the coaches threw on Tim Collier, the Premiership's heaviest player, and the gaint lock helped inch Warriors closer to the line.

Fox then indicated that Irish's defence had interfered with the rucking Worcester players, most notably Hickey, and the penalty try was awarded to Warriors.

After a nerve-jangling last few minutes, the relief was clear for all to see as the Worcester players celebrated the most unlikely of victories.

Warriors: Delport (Tucker); Hylton, Rasmussen, Lombard, Hinshelwood; Brown (Drahm), Gomarsall (Powell); Windo, Van Niekerk (Fortey), Horsman, Murphy (Collier), Gillies, Vaili (MacDonald, Horstmann), Sanderson, Hickey.

Warriors man-of-the-match: Drew Hickey.

Referee: Martin Fox. Attendance: 7,118.