Harlequins 41 Worcester 35: Opportunist Danny Care spares Quins' blushes

Harlequins needed Danny Care to be at his opportunist best to save them from an embarrassing defeat against the Premiership’s bottom club and divert attention from the Marland Yarde saga.

Worcester trebled their season’s points tally by claiming two bonus points from a frenetic contest, but it could easily have been all five had Jono Lance and Tom Heathcote not missed six kicks between them.

Their inaccuracy cost Worcester 13 points and with it the chance of a first away Premiership victory since they won at The Stoop in March 2016.

In contract, Marcus Smith and Tim Swiel found the target with all their kicks apart from one bizarre lapse from Smith. The ball wobbled off the tee as he stepped up to kick and, as he had no time to replace it, his only option was to drop kick the ball. He opted to try to run the ball but was pulled back by referee JP Doyle.

From the resulting scrum, Care pounced to score a poacher’s try. The ball squirted out on Worcester’s side, but Care got his boot to it, dribbled ahead and managed to dot the ball down for his 50th Premiership try before the cover defence got to him.

He then set up centre Jamie Roberts for the bonus point try when he tapped and ran a penalty that looked safer to kick and also played an important role in defence by dislodging the ball from the arms of his opposite number, Jonny Arr, as he went over for a try when the match was still in the balance.

“Danny took a bang in the first half and had a sore calf. I was really worried about whether he could carry on, but he is pretty durable for a little lad,” said Harlequins’ director of rugby, John Kingston, no doubt relieved to be able to talk about a player other than Yarde who was again left out and is expected to sign for Sale this week.

Charlie Walker took his chance to impress in Yarde’s absence with a superb individual try when he gathered from Tom Howe and sliced through some flimsy tackling for Harlequins’ fifth and final score.

They thought the match was won then and switched off for the final 15 minutes, allowing Worcester to score three tries, two of them from replacement wing Dean Hammond.

Heathcote eventually found the target when he converted Jack Singleton’s 78th minute try, one of only two successful kicks from Worcester all afternoon, but their head coach, Carl Hogg, was more concerned about the close-range try from Matt Luamanu they conceded on the stroke of half-time.

“The pivotal try was just before half-time when we were leading 18-10 and playing some reasonable rugby,” he said. “We lost control of the game for 10 to 15 minutes after half-time.”

Worcester lost Arr midway through the second half after he was knocked out trying to tackle Luamanu.

With a full team of players already on the injured list, it was a blow they could ill-afford, but Kingston reckoned Harlequins’ casualty list is even worse.

“We have 28 players injured and unavailable. I was proud of the fact the guys rolled their sleeves up and got the job done today,” he said.