Ospreys and Glasgow record tame draw

FLY-HALVES Gareth Owen and Dan Parks swapped three penalties apiece as the Ospreys and Glasgow fought out a tame 9-9 Magners League draw at the Liberty Stadium.

The Ospreys led the game either side of the interval but two Parks penalties earned Glasgow a draw which takes them to second behind leaders Ulster on points difference.

There was a late change to the Ospreys line-up when Marty Holah pulled a hamstring in the warm-up and was replaced by Steve Tandy.

It provided another personnel problem for the Ospreys, who were already without 10 players on international duty and another 13 on the casualty list.

Glasgow had two early encouraging opportunities to score a try but both times they failed to get the ball out to the left wing quickly enough.

A feature of the Ospreys' early play was their offensive tackling, in particular Richard Hibbard and captain for the night Ian Gough, who was left out of Wales's 29-man squad this week.

The Ospreys were given some real go-forward by full-back and subsequent man of the match Barry Davies, who many thought should have been selected by Wales as there is no specialist No. 15 in their party.

It was the home side who went into the lead with a penalty by Owen on 14 minutes, a kick which was cancelled out by Parks seven minutes later.

Owen put the Ospreys into a 6-3 lead, which they were to hold until half-time, with a second penalty on 28 minutes.

There were more injury worries for the Ospreys when Filo Tiatia and Nikki Walker were involved in a sickening clash of heads. Walker, named in the Scotland squad, needed treatment for a cut under his eye.

Shortly before the interval the Ospreys had two opportunities at scoring tries.

First, scrum-half Liam Davies made a break but was hauled down just short by wing Colin Shaw.

Then the television match official Nigel Whitehouse ruled out a try after a pile-up on the line.

At the start of the second half both Owen and Parks swapped penalties as referee Peter Fitzgibbon officiated the ruck area with an iron fist.

But it was from a scrum that the Ospreys were penalised, which allowed Parks to kick his third penalty and draw the scores level on 69 minutes.

Owen had a chance to regain the lead for the Ospreys but missed his penalty shot two minutes later, then, in the final 90 seconds with the rain teeming down, he also missed a drop-goal attempt.