On a cold night in Galway, a professional Connacht did well against a never-give-up Treviso side.
The Italians came to Galway seeking a repeat of their previous victory over Connacht last year in the Sportsground where they held onto a 15-0 lead against a Connacht comeback that fell just short (13-15). However Connacht are now well aware of what this Italian side bring to the league and they went about their business in a professional manner from the start, building pressure by keeping play as much inside the Treviso half as they could. They were rewarded for their efforts with two converter penalty opportunities by Parks in the 7th and 15th minute of the match.
Parks also was instrumental in the creation of the first Connacht try of the match. Approaching the 30 minute mark Parks placed a lofted chip kick to the wing where Clifden's Tiernan O'Halloran collected it. O'Halloran did well to make a lot of ground with the space afforded him, and just before the tacle arrived he off-loaded to the supporting home-debutant Danie Poolman. Poolman had to win some scrappy possession to make the try, but once the Main Stand let out asatisfied roar those fans with a poorer view of the action knew that he must have succeeded in his efforts.
One of the posters in the forum (Borders no.2) summed up the second half:
2nd half in the main was awful, account has to be taken of the evening but some of the mistakes were very poor and overall we lacked direction and left Treviso in the game
There were some more positive's from the game though. Andrew Browne's return to the field was a real eye-opener, with the blind-side putting in some huge hits, getting into the thick of the action and carrying well on top of that. Despite a (major) funk in the first 25 minutes of the half Parks did well to direct the troops back down into Treviso territory. Gavin also made his reappearance on the pitch and immediately set about getting onto the end of a lovely backline move that saw him sail over the line for a try.
Don't let those highlight disguise the facts though. For much of the second half Treviso had put Connacht under a lot of pressure, and ill-discipline on the Connacht side gave Treviso a foothold on the scoreboard 20 minutes in. Not long after that another penalty came off the post, which would have seen the scores come to 13-6 if it had succeeded. Many in the Clan Terrace and the Main Stand must have been wondering if Connacht were about to once more snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Fortunately Connacht look to be a side maturing. They saw the victory out and for their first half efforts the scoreboard may be considered accurate enough a reflection on the game as a whole.