Eagles hold on to beat French Barbarians

The USA held on to defeat the French Barbarians 26-21 at AVEVA Stadium on Friday night. Hot and humid conditions in Houston saw both teams struggling with fatigue, and a series of late penalties dragged the game into the 87th minute as the Eagles successfully defended their line.

A drop-goal from Ruben de Haas opened the scoring after a goal-line drop-out in the 15th minute. The visitors would reply with a try from a lineout error, but Christian Dyer and David Ainu’u would cross the line with AJ MacGinty converting both to give the Eagles a 17-7 halftime lead.

Two penalty goals stretched the lead to 23-7 but then a yellow card to de Haas who was caught offside gave the Barbarians a burst of energy. Two converted tries closed the gap to just two points before a 75th minute penalty from Luke Carty secured the result.

The Eagles will now depart to Santiago for the first leg of the World Cup Qualifying series against Chile. Following Saturday’s test the team will return to play the second leg at Infinity Park on July 16. The winner advances directly to RWC 2023 while the loser goes to November’s Repechage tournament.

 

SCORING

USA 26
Tries – C. Dyer (28′), D. Ainu’u (38′)
Cons – A. MacGinty 2 (29′, 39′)
Pens – A. MacGinty 2 (44′, 52′), L. Carty (75′)
DG – R. de Haas (15′)
YC – R. de Haas (54′)

BARBARIANS 21

 

TEAMS

USA
1 David Ainu’u, 2 Kapeli Pifeleti, 3 Paul Mullen, 4 Nick Civetta, 5 Greg Peterson, 6 Hanco Germishuys, 7 Moni Tonga’uiha, 8 Cam Dolan, 9 Ruben de Haas, 10 AJ MacGinty (capt.), 11 Mitch Wilson, 12 Bryce Campbell, 13 Tavite Lopeti, 14 Christian Dyer, 15 Marcel Brache

Replacements: 16 Mike Sosene-Feagai, 17 Chance Wenglewski, 18 Joe Taufete’e, 19 Siaosi Mahoni, 20 Benjamín Bonasso, 21 Nate Augspurger, 22 Paul Lasike, 23 Luke Carty

FRENCH BARBARIANS
1 Jefferson Poirot, 2 Clément Maynadier, 3 Nicolas Corato, 4 Romain Sazy (capt.), 5 Jimi Maximin, 6 Esteban Abadie, 7 Alexandre Roumat, 8 Louis Picamoles, 9 Thomas Berjon, 10 François Trinh-Duc, 11 Mathieu Acebes, 12 Pierre Aguillon, 13 Jean-Baptiste Dubié, 14 Adrien Lapègue, 15 Nans Ducuing

Replacements: 16 Adrien Pélissié, 17 Sébastien Taofifenua, 18 William Wavrin, 19 Anthime Hemery, 20 Samuel Marques, 21 Louis Foursans, 22 Raphaël Lagarde, 23 Arthur Joly

 

MATCH OFFICIALS

Referee: Adam Jones (Wales)
Assistants: Francisco González (Uruguay) & Peter Pender (Canada)
TMO: Andrew Hosie (Canada)