When two greats of the Welsh recreation like Shane Williams and Justin Tipuric describe a participant as “very good” and “wonderful”, that’s reward certainly.
These had been their plaudits for Ospreys No 8 Morgan Morris after he produced yet one more Man of the Match efficiency in his workforce’s 26-13 victory over Dragons RFC in Swansea.
Morris has arguably been essentially the most constant participant in Welsh rugby during the last three or 4 seasons, however he stays uncapped having not obtained a name as much as the nationwide squad.
His skipper Tipuric, who is aware of a factor or two about again row play, can’t converse extremely sufficient of him, saying: “He has been wonderful for years and years now. He’s simply class.”
Wales wing legend Williams was commentating on the derby for Premier Sports activities and spoke in glowing phrases about Morris’ perseverance.
“He’s simply been very good,” he stated. “He hasn’t been chosen within the Welsh workforce. It seems like Warren Gatland just isn’t in the intervening time.
“However what I like about him is the very fact he nonetheless retains his head up, retains working laborious in coaching week-in, week-out and retains getting the performances.
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“It’s the one method you may show a coach improper and also you’ve obtained to be happy with the very fact he’s doing that. He’s been nice.”
Including his ideas on Morris’ worldwide possibilities, Ospreys coach Toby Sales space stated: “We really feel he’s getting nearer on a regular basis and that’s all the way down to the work he has put in.
“He’s obtained bodily fitter and we’re beginning to see the fruits of his labour. We’re beginning to see visibility on each side of the ball.
“If he’s not placing the purple shirt on, he’s placing the white shirt on and we all know what he’s going to ship.”
Morris was a rampaging presence with ball in hand towards the Dragons, whereas he additionally confirmed his skill-set with a powerful offload to ship scrum-half Reuben Morgan-Williams over simply earlier than the break.
That rating got here in between a brace of tries for Wales hooker Dewi Lake, with centre Keiran Williams clinching the all-important bonus level by touching down close to the hour mark.
It’s a outcome that retains alive the eleventh-placed Ospreys’ mathematical hopes of constructing the play-offs. They have to now declare one other bonus level victory – towards Cardiff Rugby on Judgement Day – and hope outcomes go their method elsewhere.
The win over the Dragons additionally means they’ve clinched the Welsh Protect, which relies on league matches between the 4 areas.
Reflecting on the sport, Sales space stated: “We’re glad. You’ll be able to’t get greater than 5 factors and that was the primary factor. We scored some good tries and our set-piece was dominant. It goes into the ultimate weekend now.”
Indiscipline value the Dragons expensive as they leaked three tries throughout the sin bin interval following yellow playing cards for Aaron Wainwright and Dane Blacker, whereas they conceded 20 penalties in all.
Their head coach Dai Flanagan stated: “We couldn’t get a foothold within the recreation. We obtained annoyed and dived in and gave penalties away which put them again in areas the place they had been stronger. We went all the way down to 13 males and there was a large momentum swing. Hopefully we are going to study classes.”
As for the 2 different Welsh sides, they each recorded bonus level victories away from house.
The Scarlets beat Zebre Parma 32-18 out in Italy with scrum-half Gareth Davies touching down twice to turn into simply the second Welshman – after membership colleague Steff Evans – to attain 50 league tries.
Participant of the Match Davies stated: “It’s good to get the win. It’s a tricky place to return.
“We knew Zebre had been going to return out all weapons blazing and so they actually did problem us within the first 20 minutes, however I believed we obtained collectively and managed the sport effectively and got here away with a superb win.
“Now we have had a tricky previous season, so it’s good to have a superb win out right here and hopefully it’ll give us a little bit of momentum going into the final recreation of the season.”
Finishing among the best weekends of the marketing campaign for the Welsh areas, Cardiff defeated the Hollywoodbets Sharks 36-14 in Durban to finish a ten-match dropping run in all competitions.
Skipper Liam Belcher declared: “We wanted that. We hadn’t had a win since Boxing Day.
“It’s been tough-going with outcomes, dropping within the final minute and stuff like that. It was an enormous effort from the squad.”
The Participant of the Match award went to Ben Thomas who moved from his common centre berth to start out at fly-half.
Giving his ideas on the win, he stated: “It’s very pleasing. We wanted that efficiency. We’ve had numerous video games the place we’ve run groups shut and never come away with the outcome.
“It was a superb efficiency and the outcome was large for us.
“We are going to go into the Judgement Day derby towards the Ospreys now and actually give it a go.”
