Perpignan demolish woeful Castres

ENGLAND forward Perry Freshwater was on the scoresheet as Perpignan comfortably overcame French rivals Castres in Heineken Cup Pool One last night.

Perpignan benefited from a penalty try and Colin Gaston also touched down as the hosts wrapped up the game in the second half.

They had led just 9-3 at the interval after three penalties from Nicolas Laharrague.

Meanwhile Neath-Swansea Ospreys were made to work hard for their 26-9 bonus point win over Calvisano which took them to the top of Heineken Pool 3, ahead of Stade Francais.

But two tries in the first half from Ryan Jones and Lee Byrne were followed by scores by Adam Jones and Andy Lloyd in the second to give the Ospreys a 10 out of 10 points return against the Italians.

Despite the win coach Lyn Jones will be expecting better things of his side in their last two Heineken encounters against Stade Francais (home) and Sale (away) in January if they are to make the quarter-finals.

Early home pressure produced a try for No.8 Ryan Jones in the fourth minute, but James Hook was wide with the touchline conversion.

Calvisano’s Roland De Marigny put over a penalty seven minutes later to make it 5-3.

Three minutes before half-time the Ospreys grabbed a valuable second try as Byrne handed off a would-be tackler to go over. Hook converted to give the Welsh region a 12-3 interval lead.

Prop Adam Jones was on the end of an impressive team score after only two minutes of the second period. The Hook conversion made it 19-3.

De Marigny converted two penalties — the first after Jonathan Thomas was sin-binned for a professional foul. Thomas was followed into the bin seven minutes later by replacement Ben Gissing, the subject of an Ospreys citing from the first game.

The Ospreys then secured the all-important fourth try and the bonus point when Lloyd squeezed over. Hook’s third conversion made it 26-9.

Elsewhere Bristol put one foot into the European Challenge Cup quarter-finals with a predictable mauling of Bayonne at the Memorial Stadium last night.

With two pool matches left, last night’s 48-6 win over the French minnows leaves Richard Hill’s team in the box seat for a home match in the play-offs.

They face a tricky game at the Newport Gwent Dragons in early January, but are virtually certain to pick up five points at home to Bucuresti in the final-round match.

Craig Morgan, Lee Robinson and back-rower Joe El Abd ran in tries in an entertaining opening half-hour, and England scrum-half Shaun Perry bagged the bonus-point try to give the home side a 24-3 lead at the break that was never going to be overtaken.

Perry scored his second shortly after the break, and Robinson went over twice in quick succession to complete his hat-trick and leave Bristol on 19 out of a possible 20 points in the opening four rounds of the tournament.