Champions Cup roundup: Slade kicks late conversion as Exeter stun Toulon
Henry Slade held his nerve to land a match-winning conversion with the game’s final kick as Exeter launched their Champions Cup campaign with a stunning 19-18 victory over Toulon. They trailed by 13 points at half-time, but they kept the French Top 14 title contenders scoreless after the break.
Jacques Vermeulen touched down from close range for Exeter’s third try with a minute left at the Stade Mayol, then Slade stepped up to convert. It means Exeter made a flying start to the tournament.
Harvey Skinner scored an early interception try for Exeter, but Toulon then took charge as the prop Beka Gigashvili and the former Leicester scrum-half, Ben White, touched down, while Enzo Hervé kicked a conversion and two penalties.
It left Exeter 18-5 adrift at the interval, but the second-half performance will be remembered as one of the finest in their European history, with hooker Max Norey claiming a try that Slade converted before the memorable finale.
In the Challenge Cup, George Barton ended Gloucester’s losing streak by kicking five penalties for a 15-10 victory over tournament debutants Black Lion in Tbilisi.
Gloucester made the trip to Georgia after suffering six successive Premiership defeats – a sequence of results that had ramped up external pressure on their rugby director, George Skivington.
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But they prevailed in a tense encounter at the Mikheil Meskhi Stadium. Barton kicked two early penalties before Black Lion went ahead through a Luka Matkava try that he also converted, but the fly-half completed a hat-trick before the break.
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The second period proved tryless, but two more Barton penalties to one from Matkava meant Gloucester rediscovered a winning formula.