Edinburgh's surge continues

Paterson: scored a try and kicked 12 points for hosts

Surging Edinburgh made it three Magners League wins on the spin with a 27-15 triumph over a lacklustre Dragons side at Murrayfield.

Greg Laidlaw, Tim Visser and Chris Paterson, who also kicked 12 points, all scored tries for the hosts to help the Gunners extend their streak.

The visitors did at one stage lead thanks to Aled Brew going over but despite Adam Hughes crossing in the second half, they were always second best.

They might have realised it wasn't going to be their night as early as the first minute when they were penalised straight from the kick-off.

Dominated

Paterson stroked over the three points but although they dominated for long periods of the first half-hour, Edinburgh were unable to put points on the board.

Visser - the league's top scorer - did come close to scoring when he broke free from the halfway line, swatted off one tackler then chipped ahead, only to be beaten to the rolling ball by Jonathan Evans.

Instead it the Dragons who grabbed the opening try of the contest, Brew powering his way over from a pass from Jason Tovey, who also added the conversion.

Edinburgh, though, produced an emphatic response to falling behind. Visser broke clear again but this time offloaded to Laidlaw, who escaped the clutches of two Dragons to slide over.

Paterson converted and also added a long-range penalty in the 35th minute to give his side a 13-7 advantage at the interval.

Boosted

Boosted by their strong finish to the first half, Edinburgh moved further clear at the start of the second with Visser's 14th try of the league campaign.

The extras were added by Paterson before the full-back then went over for a try himself, Visser turning from scorer to provider to set up his team-mate for a run-in.

Tovey clawed back three points with a penalty, but was off the mark with the conversion attempt after Adam Hughes raced ahead to score from a kick that eluded Visser.

However, that was as close as the Welsh team got to launching a late comeback in the Scottish capital.

Both sides finished the contest with 14 men when Andrew Coombs and Esteban Lozada were sin-binned following a punch-up involving several players.