Relegation looms large for London Irish

London Irish 14, Leeds 26

Relegation continues to loom large for Conor O’Shea’s London Irish team after a damaging defeat by Leeds Tykes.

The Exiles could not match the pace or talent of the mid-table side in the first half, and despite a spirited second-half comeback their Premiership lives are still on the line.

The afternoon could not have started worse for Irish with the loss of inspirational player-coach Brendan Venter after just three minutes, and the South African has now probably played his last game for the club having sustained knee ligament damage.

Leeds immediately capitalised on the disruption with Braam Van Straaten booting a penalty which fly-half Gordon Ross soon matched after van Straaten also left the field with an injury.

Barry Everitt replied for London Irish but Ross stretched Leeds’ advantage with a third penalty before scrum-half Alan Dickens touched down for a superb try to leave Irish on the back foot. Ross converted before adding a drop-goal to make the score 19-3 to the visitors at the break.

But the home side clearly received a wake-up call at half-time. Mark Mapletoft replaced Everitt and the fly-half soon slotted over a penalty.

Winger Paul Sackey then reduced the deficit further with a 57th minute try and it was a deserved score for Irish, who had just minutes earlier looked like they had done enough to score through Kevin Barrett.

It was not to be, but after the restart the ball was spread wide to Sackey and with just one man to challenge him he skirted around to score.

But with lock Chris Murphy crashing over the line despite a forward pass by winger Chris Hall, Leeds stretched their lead to 12 points and denied London Irish a crucial bonus point.