Forgotten England wing scores wonder try for Gloucester as Sale Sharks’ slump continue

Planet Rugby
Gloucester wing Ollie Thorley on a run.

Gloucester wing Ollie Thorley on a run.

One-cap England international Ollie Thorley scored a wonderful solo try as Gloucester claimed a 32-20 bonus-point triumph against Sale Sharks at Kingsholm on Sunday.

Thorley’s try came on five minutes as he collected a stray Sale pass and set off for the line, throwing in a devastating right foot step en route to diving over the whitewash.

Gloucester would score further tries through George McGuigan, Ruan Ackermann and Charlie Atkinson, with Santiago Carreras adding 12 points off the tee in a welcome win.

Gus Warr and Tommy Taylor went over for Sale Sharks as their woes continued, with this their third Premiership loss in a row as they slide down the table to seventh spot.

Click here for scorers

Sale, who lost South African forwards Cobus Wiese and Dan du Preez in the first half hour, were their own worst enemies – picking up two yellow cards as they fell to their fifth defeat in succession in all competitions.

Gloucester conceded a couple of early penalties and Sale looked to have capitalised when Wiese crossed the line only for the giant lock to find himself held up by Thorley.

The hosts soon made them pay for their profligacy when the industrious Thorley seized on a loose ball to run 50 metres and score.

After 10 minutes, Sale suffered a further blow when Wiese left the field clutching his arm to be replaced by Ben Bamber but they immediately overcame this setback when Warr dived into a maul to level the scores.

However, a disastrous catalogue of errors from Sale gifted the lead back to the home side.

A dithering Arron Reed ran from behind his goal line, his pass to Telusa Veainu was then dropped before Sam Dugdale came from an offside position to try and clear up the damage.

He succeeded in doing so but was yellow-carded for his troubles and from the resulting line-out McGuigan finished off a driving maul.

Sale’s woes soon continued by conceding a third try from a maul 25 metres out, Ackermann bursting between the two opposition props on a 25-metre run to the line.

Dugdale returned from the sin-bin just in time to see his number eight Dan du Preez stretchered off with a knee injury but a penalty from Rob du Preez kept his side in contention.

Gloucester responded in style with their bonus-point try. An initial break from Seb Atkinson was carried on by Chris Harris, Thorley and Carreras before Atkinson touched down. Carreras converted and the hosts had a 26-10 interval lead.

After a frenetic first half containing five tries, it was no surprise that the pace slowed after the interval which resulted in a scoreless 16 minutes before Rob du Preez kicked his second penalty.

Sale had hopes of a revival but they were blunted when Joe Carpenter was yellow-carded for taking Carreras out in the air, with the full-back kicking the resulting penalty.

However Gloucester lost skipper Lewis Ludlow to the sin-bin for a deliberate offside, with Sale benefitting from his absence to score a try through Taylor.

Ludlow was able to return with no further damage to the scoreboard and ensure that Sale took nothing from the game, with Carreras kicking a last-minute penalty.

The teams

Gloucester: 15 Santi Carreras, 14 Alex Hearle, 13 Chris Harris, 12 Seb Atkinson, 11 Ollie Thorley, 10 Charlie Atkinson, 9 Caolan Englefield, 8 Zach Mercer, 7 Lewis Ludlow (c), 6 Ruan Ackermann, 5 Matias Alemanno, 4 Freddie Clarke, 3 Kirill Gotovtsev, 2 George McGuigan, 1 Jamal Ford-Robinson
Replacements: 16 Seb Blake, 17 Harry Elrington, 18 Ciaran Knight, 19 Albert Tuisue, 20 Jack Clement, 21 Stephen Varney, 22 Max Llewellyn, 23 Josh Hathaway

Sale Sharks: 15 Joe Carpenter, 14 Telusa Veainu, 13 Sam James, 12 Sam Bedlow, 11 Arron Reed, 10 Rob du Preez, 9 Gus Warr, 8 Dan du Preez, 7 Sam Dugdale, 6 Ernst van Rhyn, 5 Josh Beaumont, 4 Cobus Wiese, 3 James Harper, 2 Agustin Creevy, 1 Si McIntyre
Replacements: 16 Tommy Taylor, 17 Tumy Onasanya, 18 Asher Opoku-Fordjour, 19 Ben Bamber, 20 Rouban Birch, 21 Nye Thomas, 22 Tom Curtis, 23 Rekeiti Ma’asi-White

Referee: Luke Pearce
Assistant Referees: Christophe Ridley, Greg Macdonald
TMO: Stuart Terheege

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