Newcastle picked up where they left off against Sale in a good first half at Stradey Park, but as against Bath the second half left much to be desired and one might say we were then lucky to leave with a bonus point.

In front of a crowd of 7,195 the Falcons kicked off this Powergen Cup match and went ahead after just a few minutes with a penalty by Matt Burke thirty metres out in front of goal.

Llanelli had a chance to hit back when they were awarded a kick for Mark Mayerhofler holding on, despite the fact that the only supporting Falcon, Hall Charlton, was clearly being pulled away from the ensuing ruck.  But Mike Hercus missed the shot anyway.

But after twenty minutes the Welsh backs forged a gap in our defence as Lee Byrne scored the opening try of the day, after Hercus’s (two s’s, according to Anne Robinson on ‘Test the Nation’) conversion, Jonny Wilkinson immediately took the field in place of Toby Flood, who’d missed an important tackle in the build-up to Byrne’s score and had earlier sustained an ankle injury.

Over the next ten minutes, Wilkinson had two chances to kick penalties, the first going wide of the far post from halfway but then scoring from the left on 27.

Then approaching half time, Jonny sent a long cross-field kick over towards Anthony Elliott on the left, who used his scorching pace to steam through and score a great try, although I wasn’t sure he’d scored at first as I was in the beer queue with a poor view and the referee seemed to signal a penalty.  Whatever, Wilkinson converted.

But there was still time for the Scarlets to fight back, and after a knock-on in a rolling maul, our hosts recovered and caught-and-drove hooker Aled Gravelle over the line for a try on the left.  Hercus missed the conversion, the last action of the first half and we went into the break with a tight 12-13 lead.

At the interval we brought on an entirely new front row, Micky Ward, Andy Long and Robbie Morris replacing ineffective debutant Grant Anderson, Matt Thompson and Tino Paoletti.  The difference from the first half was striking, as Hercus scored (and also converted) Llanelli’s third try after an intense period of early pressure, and pretty much all we could manage in the first twenty minutes of the half was a penalty on the right which Wilkinson send wide of the near post.

On 65 minutes however we broke and from a misthrown home lineout we won a scrum on the left.  The ball was fed into midfield and Tom May popped up to score a scything try which was again converted by Wilkinson.

Soon after, Llanelli lock Inofe Afeaki was yellow carded, and the game seemed there for the taking if we could just establish some forward superiority to hold onto our lead, and as such Luke Gross came on for Andy Perry.

But it wasn’t to be as with two minutes of normal time left, the referee gave the home side a penalty way out on the left, and replacement fly-half Gareth Bowen kicked the winning points.

We attacked until full time but Wilkinson never found space for a drop goal, and when Mathew Tait’s run was halted by a tackle any chance we had was gone.  With a 22-20 win, the Scarlets replaced us at the top of Group 3, with eight points to our six.

This means we must beat Leeds in December at Headingley and hope Sale win here at Stradey Park (or draw if we get a bonus point) if we are to reach the semi-finals.

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