Premiership: Harlequins 21-12 Gloucester - Danny Care scores two tries for Quins

Scrum-half Danny Care scored twice in the first half for Harlequins

Harlequins secured their third Premiership win in a row with victory over Gloucester at The Stoop.

Danny Care and Dino Lamb put Harlequins 14-0 ahead inside 15 minutes, before Ben Morgan and Santiago Soccino closed the gap to two points.

But Care doubled his tally on the counter before the break and it proved to be the last score of the match, with the second half ending in a stalemate.

Harlequins move up to third in the table while Gloucester drop to sixth.

Gloucester, who have only won once at Twickenham Stoop in the league since 2009, have now lost their last three Premiership matches.

The visitors were struggling to get a foothold in the game when Care broke the deadlock after seven minutes of pressure from Quins, touching down from a maul. As the penalty count piled up, Lamb followed, lunging over from a metre out.

When Gloucester finally broke inside the Quins 22 they repeatedly chose to kick to the corner rather than the posts and were finally rewarded at the third time of asking when Morgan scored following a set piece. Debutant fly-half Santiago Carreras added the conversion.

Momentum began to swing as winger Jake Morris came within inches of the line only for Nick David to make a try-saving tackle, before Soccino crashed over from a maul to bring Gloucester within touching distance.

Yet against the run of play, Quins showed their attacking class, slickly passing up the pitch through Alex Dombrandt and Caden Murley from which Care crossed for the second time, pushing the lead to nine points at the break.

Gloucester stifled Harlequins for long periods of the second half, but in attack they seemed short of ideas and could not capitalise when it mattered. Morris came closest, snatching an interception inside his own 22 before darting down the pitch, only to be tackled again by David.

Louis Rees-Zammit similarly stopped Murley in his tracks to deny the hosts a try-scoring bonus point late on, although perhaps worryingly for Gloucester the Wales winger had to be helped off the pitch following an injury just before full-time, as they finished the game with 14 players.

Harlequins head coach Tabai Motson:

"It's a really hard-fought four points and the final scoreline was quite flattering to us.

"They have a fantastic line-out and driving maul, probably the best in Europe, and it was a great defensive effort on our part as they kicked the ball 40 times and therefore the game was not as open as we would have liked.

"It's the toughest competition in the world with the win being a really critical one for us in one of our best performances of the year."

Gloucester head coach George Skivington told BBC Radio Gloucestershire:

"We've got to start not disrespecting the first 10 minutes of a Premiership game.

"We had loads of pressure, we got sucked into a chaos of loads of off-loads and the stuff that Quins do really well, and we butchered a lot of opportunities that first 10 minutes.

"Always we will fight - and the boys do - but we've got to work out why we give people the lead and try to fight our way back in."

Harlequins: David, Murley, Marchant, Esterhuizen, Bassett, Allan, Care; Marler, Walker, Louw, Lamb, Herbst, Kenningham, Evans, Dombrandt.

Replacements: Head, Baxter, Kerrod, Hammond, White, Gjaltema, Edwards, Northmore.

Gloucester: Evans, Rees-Zammit, Harris, Twelvetrees, Morris, Carreras, Chapman; Rapava-Ruskin, Socino, Balmain, Clarke, Alemanno, Ackermann, Ludlow, Morgan.

Replacements: Singleton, Elrington, Knight, Jordan, Polledri, Varney, Barton, Reeves.

Referee: Wayne Barnes

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