Quade Cooper yesterday kicked a penalty goal after the final siren to give the Queensland Reds a 16-15 Super Rugby victory over Australian conference leaders the ACT Brumbies in Brisbane.
The Reds, playing at home for the last time this season, fought back from 15-6 down for much of the second half for only their fourth win of a miserable season.
In foggy, wet conditions, the Brumbies looked set to again dominate the Reds with a penalty try and a try to center Kyle Godwin to lead by nine points up until eight minutes from full time.
However, a first Super Rugby try to youngster Hamish Stewart off a final ball from 36-year-old former Wallaby flanker George Smith gave the Reds renewed hope into the final minutes.
Karmichael Hunt kicked the Reds deep into Brumbies territory, and from a scrum win Queensland earned a penalty under the posts for Wallaby flyhalf Cooper to kick the winning points.
Cooper’s goal-kicking heroics absolved him after he was culpable for letting the Brumbies skip out in front.
The flyhalf was tackled over his own try line by Tom Banks, but did not ground the ball, inviting Godwin to pounce on it when it eventually fell loose for an easy try in the 55th minute.
Godwin’s try came shortly after George Smith was yellow-carded for collapsing a Brumbies rolling maul — the 14th time a Reds player has been sent to the sin bin this season — which resulted in the Brumbies’ penalty try.
The loss was the Brumbies’ eighth of the season, yet they have still qualified for the Super Rugby finals as Australian conference champions, regardless of the remaining results.
“After the season we’ve had, it’s just nice to have a win for everyone at the club and for the fans,” Reds skipper Stephen Moore said.
“Obviously, it took to the last minute to get the win, but I’m proud of the team. It was tough conditions, but we hung in and believed in each other right till the end,” he added.
Brumbies captain Sam Carter said his team had made mistakes at crucial times.
“It was pretty disappointing. We had a lot of opportunities to close out the game, but we made silly mistakes at crucial times and we’ve only got ourselves to blame,” Carter said.
During the match the Brumbies became only the second Super Rugby side behind New Zealand’s Canterbury Crusaders (9,435 points) to reach the 8,000-point milestone in the history of the tournament.
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