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Jonny Gray’s try secured the bonus point for Glasgow before half-time.
Jonny Gray’s try secured the bonus point for Glasgow before half-time. Photograph: Stu Forster/Getty Images
Jonny Gray’s try secured the bonus point for Glasgow before half-time. Photograph: Stu Forster/Getty Images

Glasgow qualify for quarter-finals with six-try humiliation of Leicester

This article is more than 7 years old
Leicester 0-43 Glasgow
Tigers suffer heaviest ever European defeat

Should we bury Leicester or praise Glasgow? Reasons for astonishment came at us thick and fast in an extraordinary evening at Welford Road.

First, let’s be positive. Glasgow are into the quarter-finals of Europe for the first time. “It’s a great end to the chapter from where Scottish rugby started in the professional era to where it is today,” said Gregor Townsend, Glasgow’s head coach. “Twenty years ago, Glasgow were losing by 80 points; 10 years ago there wasn’t that much hope in the future of pro rugby, with one of the teams closing down and the other two not doing well. Now we’ve got a situation where we’ve had a huge number of fans down here and the team winning. That was one of our best ever performances.”

What an addition they will be to the knockout stages, where they will play at Munster or Saracens, the latter if Toulouse beat Connacht by fewer than 22 and Connacht do not collect two bonus points. A performance such as this against anyone should be lauded to the highest, but against Leicester at Welford Road it is next to astonishing, whatever the state of England’s grandest club.

That state, though, is the most desperate it has ever been. This is their heaviest defeat in Europe, eclipsing the loss at Munster before Christmas. They could not muster so much as a point. “It is really painful,” said Aaron Mauger, Leicester’s head coach. “We apologise to our people, our Tigers family. The guys are hurting inside because they care a lot. People will probably question their attitude, but I don’t think you can. We are clearly not good enough at the moment. To go down 43-0 at home is pretty painful.”

This is far from the first humiliation they have suffered this season, or this decade – they suffered one only last week – but they usually summon the pride to bounce back with at least a gritty performance, particularly if it is here. There was nothing. On the field or in the stands.

Empty seats abounded. Those travelling Glasgow fans were easily the more vocal. Leicester look like a club with its heart ripped out. Whether Richard Cockerill will be seen as the last fibre of that spluttering organ time will tell, but whatever is wrong here, evicting Cockerill has not fixed it.

Glasgow had the bonus point by half-time. Leicester heads and flapping tacklers were spinning for more or less the whole of that first half. We are still not sure about Glasgow’s ability to close out the tight ones, as against Munster last week, but there is no need for any of that with Leicester in this sort of form. And one thing we are sure of is Glasgow’s ability to play. They fielded a full XV of Scotland internationals, and this Scotland vintage is the most promising of the century by a distance. It is shaping up to be quite a Six Nations.

The Warriors came at Leicester from all angles from the off. The first try was scored in the sixth minute by Tommy Seymour, after nearly 30 phases of Glasgow precision. Mathew Tait received a yellow card at the end of the first quarter for taking out the effervescent Lee Jones – just the four Scotland caps for him, but you would never know – after he chipped ahead. By the time Tait returned, Freddie Burns had missed two forlorn penalty attempts and Leicester were 24-0 down. A penalty try had followed immediately when Glasgow kicked the penalty Tait had conceded to the corner, and Glasgow scored a blinder just before Tait returned.

Forwards and backs offloaded to each other seamlessly as they left Leicester defenders grasping in their wake – Gordon Reid to Tim Swinson to the masterful Finn Russell (sidestep, break, ruck), Ali Price to Josh Strauss to Jones (sidestep, break, pass) to Ryan Wilson – and Mark Bennett finished in the corner. Then, when Tait had returned, Glasgow scored their fourth. Jones came in from the blindside from a lineout and put Jonny Gray over.

It was a majestic team performance. But what of Leicester? Perhaps the expected backlash would materialise in the second half. No. Glasgow may have dropped off a fraction but Wilson started and finished their fifth a few minutes after the restart and Swinson drove over on the hour. That brought up a scoreline beyond most teams’ wildest dreams, Glasgow’s as much as anyone’s. But for Leicester it was a nightmare beyond their imagining.

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