Leicester Tigers enhance play-off hopes and end try drought to beat Sale Sharks 28-8
Last Updated: 02/03/15 11:11am
Leicester boosted their play-off chances with a 28-8 win over Sale, ending a wait of over five hours for an Aviva Premiership try in the process.
Laurence Pearce's 13th-minute try came 316 minutes after Leicester's last touchdown and they were also given a penalty try and a ran in a further score from centre Seremaia Bai, with fly-half Freddie Burns kicking two conversions and three penalties.
Winger Tom Arscott scored Sale's only try on a day when three players were sin-binned - Arscott and Sale team-mate Magnus Lund and Leicester's Bai.
The win, in front of a crowd of 21,896, meant Leicester leapfrogged Sale, who started the day in fifth place.
Welford Road was packed for a match billed as an eight-pointer, with both sides sitting just outside the top four on the same points total - 43.
Leicester, however, were desperate for a Premiership try, their last having come from Tom Youngs against Bath on January 4.
It took them just 13 minutes to get that monkey off their back as they stormed into a 20-3 lead after a one-sided first half.
Leicester shot out of the blocks and there was a real urgency to their play. After the two fly-halves, Freddie Burns and Nick MacLeod, had swapped penalties, Leicester got the crucial first try.
It came after lock Geoff Parling had broken the gain line. Leicester had battered away at the Sale line, Pearce broke through and, despite being tackled, managed to roll over and touch the ball down.
Burns converted and then slotted over a penalty after great work by Jordan Crane and Marcos Ayerza almost led to a second try.
Arscott was sin-binned for a deliberate knock-on before Leicester stepped up another gear. Pearce appeared to get over the line after a series of scrums near the Sale line but, while the referee disallowed the try, he also sin-binned Lund for being offside.
In the end Leicester's superiority in the scrums told and the referee awarded them a penalty try in the 33rd minute after Sale were marched backwards.
Burns kicked the conversion to make it 20-3 but that lead was trimmed 11 minutes after the interval when Sale took advantage of Leicester being reduced to 14 men - centre Bai was binned for an early tackle - with a terrific try in the right corner by Arscott.
It was the first try Leicester had conceded in 307 minutes but MacLeod missed the conversion.
Burns kicked a 60th-minute penalty to make it 23-8 but Sale continued to go for the tries in a bid to get back into the game and had the better of the second half.
With just over a minute left Bai got Leicester's third try, smashing through the defence from short range, but Burns missed the conversion.
