Dragons tame Tigers
Catalan Dragons maintained their 100 per cent winning start to the new season with a 28-20 victory over Castleford.
Last Updated: 18/02/12 6:33pm
Catalan Dragons maintained their 100 per cent winning start to the new season with a 28-20 victory over Castleford.
Josh Griffin scored a hat-trick for the Tigers in the south of France but that ultimately proved in vain as the French side ran in five tries.
Thomas Bosc, Vincent Dupport, Daryl Millard (2) and Jason Baitieri all crossed for the Dragons, while Joe Arundel also scored for Cas.
Castleford made a dream start as they retained the ball from a short kick-off, and a long cut-out pass by Rangi Chase found Griffin in plenty of space, with the winger diving in to score in the corner.
Kirk Dixon missed the conversion from close to the touchline, and that looked costly as Catalan put on a set move from a scrum 10 metres from the Castleford try-line.
With Greenshields linking into the line to create an overlap, the full-back sent in winger Bosc for the try. Scott Dureau added the conversion from out on the left to give the Catalans a scarcely-deserved lead after 13 minutes.
Steve Nash and Baitieri were both sent to the sin bin for their involvement in a brawl sparked by a Castleford high tackle.
The visitors were soon in again and it was Griffin again who pounced on a mix-up between Leon Pryce and Sebastien Raguin to race in from 40 metres out and touch down under the posts.
Dixon this time made no mistake with the conversion as he extended the Castleford lead to 10-6.
After 24 minutes Chase took centre stage as he bumped off an attempted tackle from Dureau and sent Arundel clear.
Arundel just managed to crash over the line despite Greenshields' best efforts to pull him down. Dixon again added the extra two points to give the Tigers a 10-point lead.
The score remained the same until half-time, but the first half gave little indication of what was to follow the interval.
After four minutes of the second half a short side play by Ian Henderson found Dupport and the France international managed to put the ball down in the corner one-handed despite the attentions of three Castleford players. Dureau missed the conversion.
Overlap
Griffin dived in to complete his hat-trick on the 50-minute mark after good passing along the line created space for an overlap. Dixon again failed with the touchline conversion effort but the Tigers led 20-10.
Ian Henderson was at the heart of the Dragons fightback and had a key role in the 55th-minute try which set the comeback in motion.
His kick to the right corner was knocked back by Damien Blanch and eventually found its way back to Henderson who kicked to the left and found Millard who dived over to score.
Dureau added the conversion to narrow the gap to four points.
The Dragons broke Castleford hearts in the last 10 minutes as first Pryce made one of the few line breaks in the game to find Greenshields and the full-back in turn found the supporting Millard who touched down to level the scores.
Dureau again added the conversion to give the Dragons the lead.
With seven minutes to go, Dureau's dummy and run created space for Steve Menzies to run into and his dummy out wide fooled the Castleford defence.
After Menzies drew the full-back he fed a simple pass inside to Baitieri to score and seal victory for the Dragons, with Dureau adding the conversion from in front of the posts.
