Edinburgh 16 Cardiff Blues 17
Friday 15 February 7.30pm kick off
The Blues traveled to the Scottish capital aiming to bounce back from last weekend’s defeat to Heineken Cup champions, Leinster. Edinburgh had two early penalty attempts at the posts that Gregor Hunter hooked wide. However, Patchell made no mistake with his chances minutes later to put the Blues ahead, 6-0.
Edinburgh squandered another scoring chance, this time in open play, when a floated pass went behind big Scottish winger, Dougie Fife, into touch, with nobody in front of him and the try-line just metres away.
Eventually Edinburgh won a penalty from a scrum and this time Hunter slotted it to give the Scottish side their first points of the evening before adding a second. Neither side looked like threatening the try-lines until the 35th minutes when Patchell went on a superb break in the Edinburgh twenty two, forcing the Edinburgh defence across the field, before slipping a pass to Paterson to cross the whitewash. Patchell missed the conversion but did get another penalty for the Blues to give them a 14-6 half time lead.
Half Time Edinburgh 6 Cardiff Blues 14
Both teams started the second half with more urgency and it was Edinburgh who got the first points. Fife broke down the right wing, before Owen Williams put in a good tackle on him, but when the ball was recycled prop forward Willem Nell was on hand to force his way over from short range and Hunter converted.
Having welcomed back four players from the Welsh squad, the Blues made two substitutions with Lou Reed and Andries Pretorius joining Scott Andrews and Josh Navidi on the field in the 55th minute.
Edinburgh took the lead for the first time in the game with a simple penalty for substitute fly Harry Leonard. The Blues responded with Harry Robinson going on a great break all the way from his own twenty-two, linking well with Richard Smith to carry on the move into the Edinburgh twenty two, before eventually winning a penalty. Patchell slotted it to put the Blues back ahead.
With only a point in it and five minutes left it was a tense finish but the Blues did enough to cling on to win and extend their lead over local rivals the Dragons.
Cardiff Blues 15 Jason Tovey (60off) 14 Owen Williams 13 Richard Smith 12 Gavin Evans (c) 11 Harry Robinson 10 Rhys Patchell 9 Lewis Jones (65off)
8 Robin Copeland (55off) 7 Thomas Young (55off) 6 Josh Navidi 5 James Down 4 Michael Paterson 3 Scott Andrews (60off) 2 Marc Breeze (65off) 1 Taufa’ao Filise (60off)
16 Kristian Dacey (65on) 17 Sam Hobbs (60on) 18 Benoit Bourrust (60on) 19 Lou Reed (55on) 20 Andries Pretorius (55on) 21 Alex Walker (65on) 22 Gareth Davies 23 Chris Czekaj (60on)
Edinburgh 15 Greig Tonks 14 Dougie Fife?13 Nick De Luca?12 Ben Atiga?11 Lee Jones 10 Gregor Hunter?9 Richie Rees
1 John Yapp?2 Steven Lawrie (c) ?3 Geoff Cross?4 Grant Gilchrist?5 Izak van der Westhuizen?6 David Denton?7 Stuart McInally?8 Netani Talei
16 Andy Titterrell?17 Allan Jacobsen?18 Willem Nel?19 Sean Cox?20 Hamish Watson?21 Chris Leck?22 Harry Leonard?23 Tom Brown
Cardiff Blues
Pen Patchell x 4
Tries Paterson x 1
Con
D/G
Edinburgh
Pen Hunter x 2 Leonard x 1
Tries Nel x 1
Con Leonard x 1
D/G
Attendance
Yellow Cards
Man of the match: Rhys Patchell