Cardiff earn draw at Harlequins

Harlequins 13 Cardiff Blues 13

Harlequins and Cardiff shared the honours in their hard-fought Heineken Cup Pool Three clash at The Stoop.

But the draw is far more valuable to the Welsh side, who beat Bristol in their opening group match last weekend, than Quins, who went down to Stade Francais in Paris.

Cardiff, winners of only two of their previous 19 Heineken Cup games on the road, put their woeful away form and an uninspired first-half display behind them to stage their fight back.

Harlequins looked to be heading for victory after England’s No 8 Nick Easter, playing his first match at The Stoop since the World Cup, broke the deadlock with a try in first-half injury time.

Despite spending two spells off the pitch with blood injuries – to his nose and right eye – he turned in a man-of-the-match display to galvanise the home side.

The other Harlequins point came from the boot of fly-half Chris Malone, who converted Easter’s try and kicked two penalties.

But Cardiff responded with a second-half try from scrum-half Jason Spice, converted by full-back Ben Blair, who was also successful with two penalties.

A lack-lustre Cardiff failed in the first half to reproduce the form which earned them their 34-18 bonus point home victory over Bristol last Sunday but Harlequins failed to turn their early territorial domination into points.

Malone kicked Quins ahead with a seventh minute penalty, cancelled out by Blair in the 26th.

In between the home side passed up a good try-scoring opportunity when Malone, off target with two drop goal attempts and a further first half penalty kick, failed to deliver the final pass with skipper Paul Volley on his shoulder.

The Harlequins back row of Easter, Volley and young prospect Chris Robshaw were strangling Cardiff’s attacking play, as the hosts denied Welsh international stars Tom Shanklin and Gareth Thomas the room to get into their stride.

Just as the first half looked to be heading for stalemate, England scrum-half Andy Gomarsall, also back in action on his club ground for the first time since the World Cup, put Cardiff in all sorts of trouble with a high kick.

It bounced well for England winger David Strettle, playing in the centre because of injuries, and, although he was pulled down, Cardiff’s former Quins flanker Maama Molitika, mishandled the ball into touch.

Jim Evans, the lineout supremo who had already captured two Cardiff throw-ins, collected cleanly before slipping a neat short pass to Easter who powered his way through to leave Malone an easy conversion.

Cardiff cut the lead to four points with Blair’s second penalty in the 47th minute and took the lead two minutes later when Spice ran in his try after home winger Ugo Monye failed to find touch following a mark.

The winger, who had crashed into the goalpost collecting a lofted kick from fly-half Dai Flannigan, could only return the ball into the arms of Cardiff right-wing Tom James who ran at the home defence to unleash Spence to race clear for a converted try.

It took Malone only four minutes to put Quins back on level terms with his second penalty and set up a tense last 27 minutes.

But, with both sides desperately trying to get back in front, Flannigan missed a long-range drop kick for Cardiff before Malone was off target with one for Quins.