A silky smooth Santi Carreras guided Gloucester Rugby to a comfortable 31-7 victory over Scarlets in the third pool stage game of the Challenge Cup to send the English side top of Pool 3, at least overnight.

The Cherry and Whites touched down five times through Caolan Englefield, Jack Clement and George Barton, Seb Blake and Christian Wade, with Carreras slotting two conversions and Barton one, but it was the rock solid defence - with Chris Harris at the centre of it - that was the dominant feature of the game. The Welsh visitors unlocked the defence once through Eddie James, with the try’s creator Ioan Lloyd converting, but by that point in the contest, it was a mere consolation score.

Gloucester director of rugby George Skivington said: "I think the boy's attitude was great, especially in defence which ultimately won us the game. Our connectedness there was very good, even Wadey’s try at the end was all about the massive defensive set. Chris [Harris] puts in a massive shot and Wadey makes it look very dramatic and goes the length.

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"There were some good tries in there, plenty to be pleased about, but also some inaccuracies and lots to go away and work on."

The Cherry and Whites opened the scoring with less than four minutes on the clock. George Barton whipped a pass wide to Christian Wade who burst beyond the first defender down the left wing and then grubbered through. The ball bounced off the leg off a Scarlets player and into the arms of Barton who drove for the line and went close. After a blast by Jack Clement, scrum-half Englefied darted over. Carreras added the conversion.

Scarlets responded and camped themselves in enemy territory but the Gloucester defence were in a stingy mode and held out before Jack Clement powered over at the bottom of a driving maul from a 5m lineout after the hosts were gifted an attacking platform when the Welsh side’s own lineout malfunctioned moments earlier having been pinned deep into their 22 by an astute kick from Englefield.

Once again the URC side responded by dominating territory and possession and got over the whitewash through Marnus van der Merwe but were held up under the posts by some desperate defending.

The Cherry and Whites were far more clinical with their opportunities and a gorgeous, bullet pass off the left hand of Carreras allowed Barton to attack the outside edge and the full back showed excellent determination to power through the tackle of Blair Murray to dot the ball down.

It was more of the same in the second half, with the Scarlets full of puff but with no fire.

After Josh Hathaway had gone close for the hosts before knocking on, the Premiership side’s rejuvenated catch and drive routine delivered again with replacement hooker Blake throwing to Lewis Ludlow at the back of the lineout before getting the ball back to roll down the blindside and score the bonus point try.

With 16 minutes remaining, Lloyd - playing at 10 for the majority of the match after Scarlets lost Welsh international Sam Costello to an early shoulder injury - finally unlocked the home defence with a clever grubber kick in behind which bounced into the hands of Taine Plumtree and the flanker drew in last defender George Barton before giving a pass inside for centre James to run home.

But fittingly Gloucester had the final say as a bit Harris tackle close to his try line dislodged the ball and Wade hacked the loose pill on four times before touching it down 100m down-field from whether the hosts had started. A lengthy TMO review cleared Harris of a knock on and gave the try.

The Cherry and Whites now head to Bayonne with their fate in their own hands in terms of qualification to the last 16 knockout rounds having reached the final last season.

Gloucester Rugby : 15. George Barton, 14. Christian Wade, 13. Chris Harris, 12. Max Llewellyn, 11. Josh Hathaway, 10. Santiago Carreras, 9. Caolan Englefield, 1. Mayco Vivas, 2. Jack Singleton, 3. Ciaran Knight, 4. Freddie Thomas, 5. Arthur Clark, 6. Jack Clement, 7. Lewis Ludlow (c), 8. Ruan Ackermann

Replacements: 16. Seb Blake, 17. Jamal Ford-Robinson, 18. Kirill Gotovtsev, 19. Freddie Clarke, 20. Albert Tuisue, 21. Tomos Williams, 22. Charlie Atkinson, 23. Jacob Morris.

Scarlets: 15. Ioan Lloyd, 14. Ellis Mee, 13. Macs Page, 12. Eddie James, 11. Blair Murray, 10. Sam Costelow, 9. Archie Hughes, 1. Kemsley Mathias, 2. Marnus van der Merwe, 3. Henry Thomas, 4. Alex Craig, 5. Max Douglas, 6. Taine Plumtree, 7. Josh Macleod (c), 8. Vaea Fifita

Replacements: 16. Shaun Evans, 17. Alec Hepburn, 18. Gabe Hawley, 19. Sam Lousi, 20. Jarrod Taylor, 21. Gareth Davies, 22. Joe Roberts, 23. Ioan Nicholas

Referee : Jeremy Rozier (Fra)

Assistant referees: Jonathan Gasnier (Fra) and Jean Lespes (Fra)

TMO : Thomas Charabas (Fra)

Attendance: 11,441