Charity begins away for slack Connacht

Connacht's generosity was gratefully received by the Romanians. Having donated some £5,000 towards an orphanage just outside the Romanian capital, the Connacht players also gifted Steaua Bucharest victory on Saturday.

Having struggled to assemble a scoring platform all year, Connacht showed little imagination with the plentiful possession they won. Instead, their failure to retain possession was punished by Steaua who led by 21-5 after just 23 minutes.

"We had to be critical about the inability to keep the ball long enough to do something with it," said frustrated Connacht coach Glenn Ross. "We have been desperately trying to get a win, we had the best chance and we blew it."

It did not take Connacht long to realised they had the measure of their opponents up front, but they spurned two early chances. Instead, from a scoring position, they found themselves defending a five-metre scrum after Steaua capitalised on some poor backline handling. Prop Sergiu Mocanu was fed by number eight Adrian Ghita for the opening try.

Connacht recovered well when hooker Bernard Jackman reacted quickest to open the visitors' account after Matt Mostyn had charged down a poor clearance.

However, Connacht were left reeling after the Romanian side punished two more Connacht mistakes - the first when wing Danial Baldor ran the length of the pitch with only lock Gavin Webster and Eric Elwood giving chase.

Four minutes later a Connacht knock-on became try number three with full back Florin Balmos getting in under the posts. Out-half Virgil Popisteanu converted all three.

Dominating territory and possession, Connacht sensibly opted for a five-metre scrum after catching the Steaua team offside, and number eight Ultan O'Callaghan scored his first try in a Connacht jersey. Allwood missed the conversion, but added a penalty on the stroke of half-time to close the gap to 21-13.

However, the superiority up front was not exploited in the second half, while Steaua utilised the kicking prowess of Popisteanu.

Connacht did come to within four points when Allwood scored and converted a try on 56 minutes.

Scoring sequence: 10 mins: try Mocanu con Popisteanu 7-0; 16: try Jackman 7-5; 19: try Baldor con Popisteanu 14-5; 21: try Bolmos con Popisteanu 21-5; 27: try O'Callaghan 21-10; 42: pen Allwood 21-13; 53: drop goal Popisteanu 2413; 56: try and con Allwood 24-20; 62: pen Popisteanu 27-20; 81: Drop goal Popisteanu 30-20.

BUCHAREST: F Balmos; M Dumitru, G Brezoianu, I Tofan, D Baldor; V Popisteanu, E Mitu; I Preda, F Vasilcan, S Mocanu, D Lazarescu, C Drajuceanu, S Rentea, M Micalache, A Ghita. Replacements: V Ionfca for Vasilcan (40 mins), F Dinu for Mocanu, M Dumitru for Preda (both halftime), I Ciofu for Lazarescu.

CONNACHT: S Allnutt; P Duignan, M Mostyn, M Deane, N Carolan; E Allwood, J Ferris; J Screene, B Jackman, M Cahill, G Webster, M McConnell, B Gavin, I Dillon, U O'Callaghan. Replacements: C Kilroy for Duignan (42 mins), M Steffert for Gavin (55 mins).

Referee: N Lasaga (France).