Connacht 40
Dragons 17

Rob Murphy

THE ground has been hit and Connacht are sprinting. It's a start and only that, but it's a mighty good one all the same. Four tries and a truly exceptional all round effort in terms of work rate, concentration and patience, this was as good as you could expect of any Magners League team.

Eric Elwood will be as proud as punch of the effort but understandably won't be letting anyone get ahead of themselves, and let’s face it, no one doubts they will. The Dragons call the Sportsground a bogey ground for a reason, that's seven straight defeats here now.

This is a fixture Connacht teams usually win then but that merely added to the pressure on Saturday evening, especially considering that two away games that were on the horizon. It all made the explosive start from the home side even more impressive.

Connacht left the starting blocks at a blistering pace and led 7-0 after three minutes. Keatley's flat pass to Niva Ta'Auso unlocked the visiting defence, the centre burst clear and had the ever reliable Ray Ofisa on his shoulder to release and send under the posts for the perfect start. The attitude was spot on and the Dragons were left with huge doubts.

By the half hour mark, the scoreline read 20-3, a revitalized and fired up Ian Keatley had kicked two penalties in response to one from a ponderous and largely outplayed Matthew Jones and the second try had come from Connacht's dominant scrum.

Ezra Taylor broke from the base off loaded on the ground to the on-rushing Jamie Hagen, the tight-head popped off an exquisitely simply pass to Sean Cronin who was not going to be stopped at full speed. The game looked almost dead and buried.

Elwood bemoaned the 20 minute spell that followed either side of the half afterwards. It was the only blot on the performance as Connacht slowly let the Dragons back into the contest with three penalties narrowing the gap to 20-12 early in the second half.

The third penalty was compounded by the fact that Gavin Duffy was sin binned – Connacht's second yellow as Ezra Taylor had been binned in the first half minutes before Luke Charteris was binned for the Dragons. That had most people fearing the worst but Connacht were not phased in the slightest and Keatley added two penalties in that period.

For more, read this week's Connacht Sentinel.