Rugby Celtic League: Connacht rugby's evangelical tour to the cold Midlands perished in Dubarry Park, Athlone, last night when Welsh side Llanelli ran up 20 points in the first half to effectively deny the Irish province any real chance of fighting their way back into the game.
For Michael Bradley's young side, there may be a few blushes over the quality of defence for at least two of their opponents' tries. When the team sit down with their popcorn to look at the replay analysis, it will be more video nasty than easy viewing.
While Connacht can take some crumbs of comfort from the fact that the final quarter belonged to them, and that both Connor McPhillips and Darren Yapp touched down twice to close the final score to within five points, coach Bradley need not be blinded by the flashing finish.
Although it was part Connacht's honesty and ability to fight that brought them so close, so too did Llanelli decide to try to sit within the comfort zone where they believed they were safe with three converted tries and a couple of penalties.
Connacht, however, will realise that too often Llanelli reached the breakdown first and provided their dangerous backline with quick, unfussy ball.
Too often did Connacht go into contact in possession and emerge without the ball, and too often their lineouts failed to fire.
Outhalf Eric Elwood, his socks rolled down, kicked Connacht's first score on 49 minutes. At that stage, and following two soft tries, the home team trailed 3-20.
Two minutes later Tal Selley, the Welsh side's deceptively paced outside centre, knifed in for Llanelli's third try for 3-25.
That knocked any lofty ambitions of the home side to claw back into the match, and in truth by then Connacht were chasing the bonus and not the match.
It was Gareth Bowen, Llanelli's place-kicker, who opened the scoring. Coming into the match with a kicking streak of nine successful punts behind him, Bowen loaded up again with his first two efforts giving Llanelli an 0-6 lead.
Just three minutes later scrumhalf Mike Phillips blazed a trail straight through the Connacht defence. Using a fringe gap, the tall number nine zipped through before dancing his way past a trail of Connacht shirts.
The ease of his travel was almost absurd and would have fitted more comfortably into a school's match than a top table Celtic League clash.
So at 0-20, Connacht went into the break with the prospect of running up the first two successive defeats of the season, having lost to Leinster last week in Donnybrook.
In all honesty, that looked likely as the home team were slightly off the pace and at times looked a little tired.
That out-of-kilter look was emphasised further just after halftime. Following Elwood's penalty for 3-20, on 49 minutes, the Llanelli outside centre, who along with full back Barry Davies, was always a threat, put Connacht to the sword.
Drifting from right to left inside the Connacht 22, and at an angle which seemed far too shallow to cause any real threat, Selley burnt off the two home defenders, Yapp and Tim Allnut, then accelerated up the right channel as full back Mark McHugh galloped over to cover.
McHugh reached him, but only in time to stretch the shoulder of the Welsh man's shirt, with Selley squeezing past to score under the posts.
Connacht were left with the choice to fold or react, and to their credit they raised the tempo. They will look at the score and perhaps feel the match was close, and they will also look back at the second half and see for most of it that they had a definite territorial advantage.
But there was always the sense that Llanelli had more.
Conor McPhillips finally darted in like a terrier for his try on 73 minutes and was followed by Yapp four minutes later. Both scores came when Llanelli were a man down, with former international back row Scott Quinnell sitting out a yellow card.
CONNACHT: McHugh; Mostyn, Yapp, T Allnut, McPhillips; Elwood, Walls; Hogan, Jackman, Boiroux, Browne, Farley, Neville, Carter, O'Sullivan. Replacements: Clarke, McCarthy, Swift, O'Loughlin, Hewitt, Moore, Uijs.
LLANELLI SCARLETS: B Davies; Rees, Selley, Watkins, Finau; G Bowen, Phillips; Maddocks, A Gravelle, J Davies, A Jones, J Griffiths, Cooper, Boobyer, S Quinnell. Replacements: John, R Williams, G Williams, Burn, C Thomas, Byrne.
Referee: M Changleng (Gala).
