Scarlets claim derby spoils

The Scarlets recorded a priceless derby victory to lift their spirits as they defeated Cardiff Blues 27-13 at Parc y Scarlets on Saturday.

It was the hosts' first win at their new ground, recording a two tries to one Magners League success over their fellow Welsh region.

The home side had gone into the match with a draw and a defeat in their opening two games at their new ground following the move from Stradey Park.

The Scarlets, who had not won a match since October, continued to have injury problems while the Blues rested key players such as Paul Tito, Martyn Williams, Andy Powell, Gethin Jenkins, Tom Shanklin and Ben Blair.

The opening half-an-hour of the match was riddled by aimless kicking and a lack of a coherent approach from both sides.

The Scarlets took the lead with a Stephen Jones penalty on nine minutes, which was cancelled out by a long range effort from Leigh Halfpenny, playing at full-back, three minutes later.

But both sides proceeded to miss four penalties between them in the space of nine minutes. After Jones was wayward with a kickable effort, Cardiff were off-target with three in a row - two from Halfpenny and one by Ceri Sweeney.

After one of the Scarlets' more concerted periods of pressure they went back into the lead with a second Jones penalty from the 22.

But from the restart the Blues were back level at 6-3 with a Sweeney penalty from right in front of the posts after some Scarlets hands were spotted in ruck.

Elusive

With the standard of rugby and the kicking tactics not making for good watching a try proved an elusive commodity until the final minute of the first-half.

An up and under by Blues scrum-half Darren Allinson was run back effectively by Rhys Priestland and after going through the phases scrum-half Martin Roberts squeezed his way over from a ruck to score. Jones failed with the conversion.

And Jones also missed a penalty attempt six minutes into second half after Blues' centre Jamie Robinson was yellow-carded for ball-killing.

The Scarlets continued to press and would have had a second try had Halfpenny not pulled off a good tackle on Roberts, who made a blindside break down the left.

But continued home pressure was eventually rewarded with a second try when prop Phil John crashed in as the Scarlets led 18-6.

Five minutes later, however, the Blues registered a try when wing Richard Mustoe went past two tacklers. Sweeney kicked the conversion to make it 18-13.

But the Scarlets relieved the pressure when Stephen Jones landed a 50-metre penalty on 73 minutes to take the Blues out of bonus point range, then Jones added another penalty in injury-time.