Scarlets fight back to beat struggling Dragons

Scarlets overcame a major scare against bottom-of-the-table Dragons to secure a 31-23 bonus-point victory and keep alive their hopes of a United Rugby Championship play-off spot.

Scarlets trailed 20-7 early in the second half against spirited opponents but two yellow cards and a couple of crucial errors cost Dragons their second win of the season.

Henry Thomas, Alec Hepburn, Vaea Fifita and Blair Murray scored Scarlets’ tries with Ioan Lloyd converting all four and kicking a penalty.

Jarrod Rosser scored two tries for Dragons either side of Ashton Hewitt touching down, with Angus O’Brien converting one and adding two penalties.

Penalties

Dragons suffered an early blow when prop Dylan Keller-Griffiths was sin-binned for scooping the ball back on the ground as the Gwent region conceded seven penalties in the first 18 minutes.

It was all one-way traffic but a combination of determined Dragons’ defence and sloppy play from Scarlets left the scoreboard blank during Kelleher-Griffiths’ absence.

But immediately on the prop’s return, Thomas drove over from a close-range line-out with Lloyd’s conversion giving the Scarlets a 7-0 lead after 20 minutes.

The restart enabled Dragons to break out of their half for the first time. And from their first attack they reduced the arrears, with Rosser collecting an excellent long pass from former Scarlet O’Brien to race over for his first league try in almost a year.

O’Brien missed the conversion but succeeded with a penalty to give his side an 8-7 interval lead.

Restart

Within 90 seconds of the restart, Dragons had extended that advantage when bursts from Aaron Wainwright and Rhodri Williams put the defence on the back foot to provide the opportunity for Hewitt to outflank the cover and score.

Three minutes later, the Gwent Region were over again with clever play from half-backs O’Brien and Williams setting up a second try for Rosser.

A lacklustre Scarlets badly needed a response and got one when Hepburn crashed over from close range with Dragons’ hooker Elliot Dee sin-binned for collapsing.

Scarlets had woken up and soon scored another when an elusive run from Tom Rogers and a long pass from Lloyd set up a try for Fifita.

Scarlets’ lead was short-lived as O’Brien put his side back in front with a penalty but a mistake from Dragons’ full-back Ewan Rosser gifted Murray the match-winner, with Lloyd adding a last-minute penalty.