Gloucester Rugby
Cool Laidlaw keeps his head to put gloss on Gloucester's season
Tom Hamilton
May 1, 2015
Greig Laidlaw
Greig Laidlaw© Photo by Dan Mullan/Getty Images

It was the starter before Saturday's main course at the bigger brother stadium across the road, but the Twickenham Stoop will be looked at as Gloucester's second home. For the second time in nine years, they have won the Challenge Cup on Harlequins' territory, a triumph that will put some gloss on David Humphreys' first season in charge.

Billy Twelvetrees' first 10 minutes of the match was wonderfully symbolic of Gloucester's season. They have swayed between the sublime and the ridiculous and their captain's start to the match personified this. His first pass in anger found touch only to then fumble a pass when Gloucester were going through the motions but he then ran a superb supporting line to crash over for the first try of the match.

The killer blow should have come in the 53rd minute. For all Edinburgh's precision in the set piece in the first-half, after Greig Laidlaw slotted a 40-metre penalty on the slant, Phil Burleigh's second restart in four minutes found touch. The misfire was met with donkey noises from the Gloucester supporters and cries of derision from those who had travelled south from Edinburgh.

Instead Gloucester's ill discipline gave Edinburgh a stay of execution. Both cards were preventable. Ross Moriarty was lucky just to see yellow for his knee in Fraser McKenzie's back while Billy Meakes' cheap shot was perhaps just short of a red but it was idiotic to give the referee that dilemma. In what was the first appearance from a Scottish side in a European final, Edinburgh could have won had their decision making been better at half-back in the final throes of the match but instead it was cries of Gloucester which echoed around the Baltic Stoop.

As Gloucester closed out the match, the noise from the stands was as if the Shed had decamped en mass to the Twickenham Stoop, keeping their decibels at the same level. The French oompah band which had arrived a day early was a welcome addition, while Edinburgh's supporters led a hearty bagpipe-influenced version of Flower of Scotland. The atmosphere was superb but in reality this was a match played between two mid-table sides. Errors were frequent with some wayward kicking stifling the tempo at stages, but there were moments of individual brilliance.

Jonny May's first-half 70-metre break was the highlight, but on that occasion he fell short thanks to a tap tackle from the superb Cornell du Preez. May was Gloucester's main threat while Charlie Sharples is relishing the fullback role. Matt Kvesic also put in a huge amount of work with Richard Hibbard solid in the set piece and loose.

It was the first 15 minutes of the second-half which won this match for Gloucester and they should have made more of their front-foot ball.

Edinburgh were hardly there to make up the numbers. They were in uncharted territory and having had a season similar to Gloucester's where it was hard to make rhyme or reason of their form they will have been delighted with Du Preez and Roddy Grant's performance. They had the ascendancy in the scrum - winning four penalties in this area to Gloucester's one - but lacked the tactical kicking and nous of Greig Laidlaw, who outplayed his Scotland No.9 rival Sam Hidalgo-Clyne. It would have given the watching Vern Cotter, Scotland's head coach, a timely reminder of his ability.

In the run up to the match Humphreys suggested the tournament was devalued as it no longer had the sizeable carrot for the victors of a place in the Champions Cup but it will give them something to show for a turbulent season. The manner in which they closed out the match in the final five minutes showed a new hardened, mature edge and the victory could yet be seen as a seminal moment in the development of this side.

© Tom Hamilton

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