Pulling the strings for Racing: Olly Barkley
Five penalties were enough for Racing Metro to claim a 15-3 victory over Edinburgh in a dour Heineken Cup clash at Murrayfield on Friday.
The result provisionally moves Racing to the top of Pool One - ahead of Saracens' clash with Munster on Saturday - while Edinburgh have yet to score a tournament point in four games.
The hosts were left to rue four missed penalty kick by young fly-half Piers Francis.
In a dull first half undoubtedly affected by the conditions, penalties from Olly Barkley and Gaetan Germain gave Racing a 6-3 lead.
The home side's response in the first period came through Francis, but they were unable to secure their first European victory of the season as three further Germain kicks sealed the win for the Parisians.
Having defeated the Scottish outfit 19-9 last week, the visitors were searching for a third success in this year's competition to keep themselves in contention for the quarter-finals
And they made an excellent start when a Barkley penalty gave them a 3-0 lead after five minutes.
Full-back Germain added to the score with a long-range three-pointer before the hosts finally established an element of control.
Francis had successive opportunities to put the hosts on the board, but the fly-half was initially unable to take advantage.
However, he finally slotted his third chance to reduce the arrears to 6-3 at the interval.
The second period continued where the first left off with both teams struggling to assert their authority. But Netani Talei's needless yellow card for a late tackle allowed Germain to convert his second from the tee.
Talei was then joined in the bin by visiting prop Eddy Ben Arous. Although it was the Parisians who were the more effective with a man down and two further penalties from the full-back secured the win for Racing.
The scorers:
For Edinburgh:
Pen: Francis
Yellow card: Talei
For Racing Métro:
Pens: Barkley, Germain 4
Yellow card: Ben Arous
Edinburgh: 15 Greig Tonks, 14 Lee Jones, 13 Ben Cairns, 12 Ben Atiga, 11 Dougie Fife, 10 Piers Francis, 9 Chris Leck, 8 Netani Talei, 7 Roddy Grant, 6 Stuart McInally, 5 Grant Gilchrist, 4 Robert McAlpine, 3 Geoff Cross, 2 Ross Ford, 1 John Yapp.
Replacements: 16 Andy Titterrell, 17 Allan Jacobsen, 18 Willem Nel, 19 Perry Parker, 20 Dimitri Basilaia, 21 Richie Rees, 22 Gregor Hunter, 23 Sep Visser.
Racing Métro: 15 Gaetan Germain, 14 Sereli Bobo, 13 Guillaume Bousses, 12 Alexandre Dumoulin, 11 Juan Imhoff, 10 Olly Barkley, 9 Sebastien Descons, 8 Jacques Cronje, 7 Bernard Le Roux, 6 Antoine Batut, 5 Francois van der Merwe, 4 Karim Ghezal, 3 Luc Ducalcon, 2 Dimitri Szarzewski, 1 Eddy Ben Arous.
Replacements: 16 Thomas Bianchin, 17 Julien Brugnaut, 18 Juan Pablo Orlandi, 19 Jone Qovu Nailiko, 20 Mathieu Belie, 21 Juan Martin Hernandez, 22 Fabrice Estebanez, 23 Alvaro Galindo.
Venue: Murrayfield, Edinburgh
Referee: Dudley Phillips
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