Scott's hat-trick omen

Nick Scott is hoping that his hat-trick against Nottingham will prove to be a good omen for London Welsh, as the club prepares for the Championship play-offs.

The winger crossed three times in the Exiles' 64-12 win over the Green and Whites at Old Deer Park on Saturday, two years after his last hat-trick for the club in its successful 2011/12 Championship play-off campaign.

After arriving at Welsh on loan from Bath in February 2012, Scott had already bagged play-off tries in wins over Nottingham and Doncaster Knights, before scoring a hat-trick in the Exiles' 40-19 victory against Doncaster at Castle Park.

He would go on to score in the semi-final and final as Welsh were crowned champions, and a repeat two years on would be very welcome.

"Hopefully, it's a good omen,” said Scott. "When I score three tries and Seb [Stegmann] scores two tries it means the team's attacking really well.

"You can't underestimate the work the boys are doing to put themselves into position to get a bit of depth. They were really team tries that we scored against Nottingham – it was a good attacking display when we kept hold of the ball.

"Justin [Burnell] has always given us licence to play throughout the season, it's not just a new thing, and we've taken it on board.”

If Welsh are to repeat the joyous scenes at the Kassam Stadium of 2012, when they defeated Cornish Pirates in the final and captain Jonathan Mills lifted the trophy, they'll first have to overcome Leeds Carnegie.

Welsh travel to Headingley Carnegie on May 11 (kick-off 1pm) for the 1st leg of their Championship semi-final, before welcoming Leeds to the Kassam on May 18 (kick-off 12:45pm).

The two previous meetings between the sides this season have been close affairs. When Welsh visited Headingley Carnegie in November they overturned a 12-point deficit to win 31-24 - Scott crossing twice – before grinding out a hard earned 19-10 victory at the Kassam in January.

"Leeds are a great side; they've played some really good rugby this year. When we went up to Headingley they really took it to us and we had to come back from 12 points down, but we're in the mind-set not to let that happen again,” said Scott.

"It's a Championship semi-final and we can't put ourselves in the same position and hope to claw it back.

"We need to take the lessons learnt from last time. We know they're a very good team and we know what they'll bring to the table - some very good attacking rugby.

"But we're getting better all the time, we're confident in ourselves and we've a good group of individuals.

"Everything's building to the play-offs and we're going to try and hit the ground running and go hard.”

Last weekend's victory over Nottingham saw the Exiles run in ten tries, as Justin Burnell's side bounced back from their defeat at Bristol to secure second place in the table.

"We were disappointed with our attacking display against Bristol. We learnt a lot about ourselves and what we need to do to improve and I think we implemented some of those improvements against Nottingham,” added Scott.

"We had to do a lot of defending [against Bristol] and when we got the ball back we didn't attack very well, a couple of loose kicks and we had to defend again. It was a bit of a vicious cycle.

"We felt we didn't attack as well as we can, but it's been highlighted and improved against Nottingham and fixed.”