Bourgoin battle past Leeds
Bourgoin pipped Leeds to a place in the last eight of the Amlin Challenge Cup with an 18-9 victory at Headingley.
Last Updated: 24/01/10 7:56pm
Bourgoin pipped Leeds to a place in the quarter-finals of the Amlin Challenge Cup with a hard-fought 18-9 victory at Headingley.
The Top 14 side defeated their English opponents for the second time in this season's competition to clinch Pool One.
Tries from Jean-Francois Coux and Albert Vulivuli inside the opening 12 minutes put Bourgoin in complete control of the winner-takes-all showdown.
Fly-half Benjamin Boyet managed to land one of his two conversion attempts before knocking over a penalty and a drop goal in the second half.
Penalties
All Leeds, who lost 29-19 in the reverse fixture back in October, managed in reply was a trio of penalties from the boot of Ceiron Thomas.
"We didn't perform to the level that we have been doing. We'd won four of our last five but we were a long way short today," said Leeds director of rugby Andy Key.
"Everything was stacked in our favour going into the game. We fully appreciated the fact that we were playing a very good side that had reached the final last year, but we felt that, on our own patch, we could get the win.
"We wanted to take the chance to progress but we weren't able to do that."
While Leeds can now focus all their efforts on Guinness Premiership survival, Bourgoin will look forward to an away trip to Connacht in the next round.
