DECLAN Kidney was left delighted as London Irish snapped their seven-match losing streak with a last-gasp 20-16 Gallagher Premiership upset victory at Northampton Saints on Friday night.
Dave Porecki's late try – which followed an Adam Coleman charge-down – proved decisive as Exiles recorded a third success of the league season.
And Director of Rugby, Kidney, said: "You will always take the win when you get it with the last play of the game. It is obviously important for us as a group.
“I think over Christmas we didn’t do ourselves justice and didn’t get any reward, but I thought we stuck at it, even though there are certain aspects where there is room for growth with this group.
"However, the fact that we stuck at it and got reward I’m delighted for the boys because they have been working really hard.”
After the home side suffered an early setback with a nasty looking injury to English centre Piers Francis, Irish took a 17th-minute lead when Ben Meehan's pass ended in the hands of young wing Ollie Hassell-Collins, the in-form speedster touching down. Stephen Myler struck the woodwork in attempting to add the extras against his former club, but the away side were still 5-0 in front.
A James Grayson penalty reduced the arrears, but Irish shot themselves in the foot when Meehan was sin-binned for a dangerous tackle on Cobus Reinach when his side had been awarded a penalty on their opponents five-metre line.
Myler knocked over a penalty to make it 8-3, but Reinach crossed with a trademark snipe from the base of a maul and five further points from the boot of Grayson made it 13-8 at the interval.
The game turned 10 minutes into the second period when Northampton second row Api Ratuniyarawa was shown a straight red card for a shoulder clear out on Harry Elrington, albeit after Nick Phipps became the second Exile to be yellow-carded, Grayson landed another kick to make it 16-8.
However, a dramatic final six minutes firstly saw Franco van der Merwe go over from close range for a converted score, before Porecki's heroics snatched glory at the death.
Reflecting on the game, Kidney stated: “At half-time, we knew we had done some things to give Northampton the lead, but at the same time, there was lots of good play from us.
In the second half, for the first 20 minutes, Northampton owned the ball owned possession and territory and made it difficult for us.
“We rode the storm a little bit, they had one or two penalty misses, but then we started playing and kept on playing. We are a group of different nationalities and we are learning from one another, but I think you saw the best of the different cultures come through there, until the end of the game.”
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