ACADEMY ace Tiff Eden won the battle of the kickers at Meadow Lane as Worcester Warriors came from behind to beat Nottingham 26-19 and get their British & Irish Cup campaign off to a winning start.
The 19-year-old’s six successful kicks cancelled out Dan Mugford’s four, including a hat-trick of long range penalties, which took Nottingham into a 19-13 lead.
Warriors were also helped by two tries from South African centre Dean Hammond, with his second coming in the final ten minutes to complete a superb comeback.
His first got the visitors off to the perfect start as he received Richard de Carpentier’s pass before sprinting over in the corner. Eden finished his first attempt at the posts from out-wide.
With seven points on the board after just three minutes, Warriors look set to rollover their opponents like they did in the league two weeks ago, winning 55-16.
But when Mike Daniels was sin-binned, Nottingham grew in confidence and with the man advantage they levelled the scores. Matthew Everand touched down after being forced over by a driving maul, which Mugford converted.
Nottingham were beginning to play some attractive free-flowing rugby, but it was the superb kicking of Mugford which was proving the difference in the tie. The fly half landed two penalties from inside his half to give his side a 13-7 advantage after half an hour.
Eden kept Warriors in touch with a simple penalty, but it was the hosts’ half as they finished it with another accurate kick from Mugford, which split the posts.
The kicking contest continued after the break as Eden added three points to reduce Worcester’s deficit to 16-13.
Nottingham had chances to extend their lead as they had the visitors pinned back, but the Warriors side, which included teenagers Huw Taylor and Andrew Boyce in the back row, dug deep to clear the danger.
Luckily for the hosts, they had a stand-off in fine form as Mugford fired over another penalty to give his side a six point cushion.
But that was quickly chipped away as Eden hit the target again from the tee before slotting home a further penalty with 12 minutes.
This set up a tense finale as they scores were locked at 19-19, but crucially it was Warriors who landed the killer blow. Max Stelling broke through Nottingham’s defence before offloading to Hammond who crossed the whitewash.
Eden kept his 100 per cent record intact with a coolly dispatched conversion before Worcester saw out the remaining minutes to seal a thrilling victory.