Tigers bare teeth against Quins
Leicester’s Marcos Ayerza and Quins’ Jor Marler were red-carded while Will Skinner and Mark Lambert were sin binned in a fractious game.
“That’s rugby,” said the Tigers’ director of rugby Richard Cockerill.
“So much happened out there and it was a fractious game at times. Marler was involved in everything. He has a Mohican hairdo dyed orange so he’s difficult to miss. It’s up to Quins to deal with him. We look to our own players.
“We certainly didn’t look like champions in that first half and were fortunate not to be worse than 10-0 down. We spoke at the break about keeping to our game plan and doing things calmly. We have some very talented players but we do need to be better as a collective because if we give Leinster the chances we gave Quins, we’ll be 30 points down at half-time.”
Ominously for Ulster, Northampton are hitting form at the right time and boosted their chances of joining the Tigers in the Aviva Premiership play-off with an eight-try 53-24 victory over Sale.
“We’ve won three out of three, which is brilliant, and we need to keep that going now,” said Northampton director of rugby Jim Mallinder. “The end is in sight and we know what to do.”
The Saints pack was rampant, producing two penalty tries. Their other tries came from scrum-half Lee Dickson, England winger Chris Ashton, prop Brian Mujati, England flanker Tom Wood and replacements Bruce Reihana and Phil Dowson, with fly-half Stephen Myler kicking 13 points.
Harlequins next European opposition, Wasps, also lost at the weekend when London Irish came from behind to beat them at the Madejski Stadium. Early tries from Riki Flutey and Rob Webber saw the visitors storm into a 12-3 lead. The Exiles wing Tom Homer then took over, kicking six unanswered penalties as Wasps paid the price for indiscipline.
A try from Irish replacement David Paice early in the second half settled the outcome, with Wasps offering little in attack.