By Sarah Braide
December 15 2002

Sale came close to avenging last weekend's home defeat against Llanelli at Stradey Park on Friday. By half time the Sharks had established a 12-9 lead that lasted until Dave Hodges scored a 75th minute try. That's us out of the Heineken Cup then. Sale scored the first try midway through the first half when Apollo Perelini strolled in under the posts, the defence apparently confused and waiting for a knock-on to be called. Nick Walshe converted to put us 7-3 up following an earlier Stephen Jones penalty.

Llanelli regained the lead with two further penalties but Sale claimed back the initiative before half time with a period of strong attacking, culminating in a corner try for Graeme Bond. The departure of Scott Quinnell before the break must have given Sale extra hope that they could sustain the lead in the second forty minutes.

Llanelli did their best to break down the Sale defence throughout the second half but it held firm until the 75th minute when Matthew Watkins' chip was picked up by Dave Hodges who dived over in the corner. Jones failed to make the conversion but took Llanelli's lead to eight points with a 78th minute penalty after Sale killed the ball on the line.

There was the chance for an injury time consolation try for Sale but the Vaughan Going pass, which would have sent Mark Cueto over the line, turned out to be forward.

Despite the result Sale played well as they did last week, and Jim Mallinder was happy enough with the performance:

"It was a bit of a difficult task coming down here, but I was delighted with the performance...Llanelli probably weren't quite as consistent in getting over the gain-line tonight as they were against us last week but we missed 28 one-on-one tackles last Friday, which you cannot afford to do", he said.

That puts qualification for the next round of the Heineken Cup well and truly out of our reach but the way the league is going so far, it looks like we will be back in Europe next year, more experienced and better prepared.

Sale Sharks: Jason Robinson (capt), Mark Cueto, Dan Harris (Nel Deane, 64), Graeme Bond, Steve Hanley, Vaughan Going, Nick Walshe, Jim Thorp (Kevin Yates, 70), Johnny Roddam, Barry Stewart (Stuart Turner, 64), Iain Fullarton, Chris Jones (Pete Anglesea, 61), Apollo Perelini, Alex Sanderson (Stuart Pinkerton, 63), Richard Wilks.

Llanelli: Garan Evans, Mark Jones, Matthew Watkins, Leigh Davies (capt), Wayne Proctor, Stephen Jones, Dwayne Peel, Iestyn Thomas, Robin McBryde, Martyn Madden, Vernon Cooper, Chris Wyatt, Simon Easterby, Scott Qunnell (David Hodges), Dafydd Jones.