Match Centre: Bristol Bears 40-36 London Irish

Bristol Bears 40-36 London Irish, Sixways

Bristol Bears managed to hold off a late fightback from London Irish as they sealed a 40-36 win in the third round of the Gallagher Premiership at Sixways on Saturday.

This is third win for Bristol in as many games as they are at the top of the table while London Irish are at sixth place after losing two out of the three matches.

London Irish raced to a flying start as a dummy from Henry Arundell set up Ben White over the line in the 4th minute and Paddy Jackson kicked a conversion and followed with a penalty goal in the 16th minute to race to a 0-10 lead.

The hosts responded back in the 17th minute as Luke Morahan crossed in the corner to dive over and four minutes later Will Capon crossed over at the back of a line out maul with Ellis Genge scoring his third try of the season around the half hour mark. MacGinty kicked all the three conversions as they increased the lead to 21-10.

With the break approaching, the Exiles suffered a setback as Ben White was sin-binned for a high tackle on Harry Randall and shortly the scrum-half added their fourth to claim the bonus point as Bristol completed the opening half with a 26-10 lead.

London Irish had the dominant of the early exchanges in the second half as Arundell scored from an interception and in the 50th minute Jackson collected an offload from Will Joseph to dot down with the gap coming down to 26-24.

Bristol Bears took control as skipper Jake Heenan and Max Lahiff dived from close range in short succession to extend the lead to 16 points which proved just enough as Isaac Miller and Benhard Janse van Rensburg dived over for the visitors in the final eight minutes.

Team line up:

Bristol: Piutau, Morahan, O'Conor, Bedlow, Lane, MacGinty, Randall; Genge, Capon, Sinckler, Holmes, Joyce, Vui, Heenan (c), Bradbury

Reserves: Thacker, Woolmore, Lahiff, Hawkins, Thomas, Uren, Sheedy, Purdy

London Irish: Arundell, Joseph, Rona, Van Rensburg, Hassell-Collins, Jackson, White; Goodrick-Clarke, Miller, Hoskins, Ratuniyarawa, Simmons, Rogerson (c), Pearson, Cunningham-South

Reserves: Vajner, Fischetti, Chawatama, Caulfield, Donnell, Englefield, Stokes, Loader