Leicester strike back for draw

12 April 2012

Injury-ravaged Leicester staged a pulsating second-half comeback to open their Heineken Cup campaign with a 32-32 home draw against Ospreys.

The Tigers, already decimated by injuries, lost four more key players before kick-off and found themselves 26-8 down late in the first half. The Ospreys had stormed ahead with tries from Shane Williams and Tommy Bowe - plus a faultless kicking performance from teenage fly-half Dan Biggar, who finished with 22 points.

Man of the match Billy Twelvetrees added to Johne Murphy's early try, before Argentinian winger Lucas Amorosino and then Jeremy Staunton earned the Tigers a share of the spoils and a four-try bonus point.

Leicester have not lost at Welford Road in more than a year, and the Ospreys will be kicking themselves at letting such a golden opportunity slip through their fingers.

The Tigers - already without the likes Geordan Murphy, Toby Flood and Sam Vesty - were forced into a major backline reshuffle after Harry Ellis, Matt Smith and centre pairing Aaron Mauger and Dan Hipkiss were all ruled out.

Things got even worse for the Tigers at the interval when Anthony Allen was replaced in midfield by the former All Black flanker Craig Newby.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in