There was drama before the start of the game. Mike Brown suffered back spasms during the warm up and couldn’t play. There is some confusion about what happened next. The official version of events is listed in the teamsheet below. However, according to the Quins backroom staff in the Press Box, Williams went to fullback, Tiesi went to 13 and George went out on the wing. Whatever.

Within 3 minutes the new defensive alignment had been ripped apart and Rabeni finished of the move with a converted try. That seemed to galvanise Quins into action. Evans kicked a penalty and Quins kept pressing. On the back foot, Leeds started conceding penalties. The visitors elected not to kick for points. After one tap, the next penalty was kicked to the corner and Quins attacking intentions were rewarded when, two phases after winning the lineout Robshaw barrelled over the line to give Quins the lead. The simple conversion made it 10-7.

On 20 minutes a Leeds penalty tied the scores, but soon after the restart a high kick by Evans was misjudged by Hinton the Leeds fullback, who allowed the ball to bounce – over his head! Following up, George Lowe scored unopposed. Once again an easy conversion was despatched. (There was, apparently, some controversy about the play leading up to Evans’ ‘Garry Owen’, which completely passed me by. I saw nothing wrong.)

Quins’ momentum stalled after half an hour when Danny Care was yellow carded for driving his opposite number head first into the floor whilst making a tackle. Leeds sensed their chance and came hard at Quins. Predictably, a penalty ensued and the arrears were cut to just four.

With two minutes left to halftime, what appeared to be the pivotal moment occurred. NEv did another searing run and was stopped just short of the line. The recycled ball went to Robshaw who went to ground beyond the try line for his second score of the night. Two more points for NEv, 24-13. Halftime, thank you very much….

When another Evans penalty went over as the first score of the second half it seemed a perfect platform to close out the game. Unfortunately, Quins forgot how to defend rolling mauls. When Leeds scored two tries in only seven minutes, with only another Evans penalty sandwiched in between, it was a three point score line – with the appropriate stress levels for all Quins at the ground. Amazingly it proved to be the final score of the game.

The final twenty was dominated by a tactical kicking master class from the Kiwi 10. Time after time he pinned Leeds back but, despite all the territory and most of the possession, Quins failed to grab the bonus point try and some breathing space.

Predictably they had to survive one final flourish in the last minute, but Leeds never really threatened to score again. The final whistle came and, with it, Quins second away win of the season and the heady heights of sixth in the table.

Afterwards John Kingston said: “There were times when we played really well. The challenge at half time was to get away and win by 40-50 points. That sounds silly when you win 30-27, but we weren’t good enough with the way we handled things in that second half at times. We got ourselves into a situation with 20 minutes to go where it turned into an arm wrestle. I actually thought we handled that (final) 20 minutes well.”

Next up is a break from GP action with the two Heineken ties against Sale, before Big Game 2 at the Big Stoop. Nine league points in two weeks has certainly made the season seem so much better!

Harlequins:
15. Tom Williams 14. David Strettle 13. George Lowe 12. Gonzalo Tiesi 11. Nils Mordt  10. Nick Evans 9. Danny Care 1. Ceri Jones 2. Tani Fuga 3. John Andress 4. James Percival 5. George Robson 6. Tom Guest 7. Chris Robshaw 8. Nick Easter (capt)
Replacements: 16. Chris Brooker (for Fuga 66) 17. Aston Croall 18. Mark Lambert (for Andress 58)19. Lewis Stevenson (for Percival 66) 20. Will Skinner (for Guest 58) 21. Karl Dickson 22. Rory Clegg 23. Josh Drauniniu

Leeds:
15. Leigh Hinton 14. Richard Welding 13. Seru Rabeni 12. Scott Barrow 11. Lee Blackett 10. Joe Ford 9. Andy Gomarsall 1. Gareth Hardy 2. Vili Ma'asi 3. Juan Gomez 4. Erik Lund 5. Marco Wentzel (C) 6. Kearnan Myall 7. Calum Clark 8. Rhys Oakley
Replacements: 16. Phil Nilsen (for Ma’asi 51) 17. Tommy McGee (for Gomez 66) 18. Mike MacDonald (for Hardie 51) 19. Tom Denton (for Oakley 51) 20. Jon Pendlebury 21. Scott Mathie (for Gommarsall 54) 22. Jason Strange 23. Jonny Hepworth (for Barrow 29)

Attendance: 5,090

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