Dougie Steele’s nerves unfortunately didn’t live up to the name as he missed a difficult late conversion that would have given Abu Dhabi Saracens a point on the opening day of the new Sport360° UAE Premiership against Dubai Exiles.
Exiles held on for the win despite a spirited comeback from Sarries, who scored two late tries to give themselves a fighting chance of rescuing something from the game.
Ryan Woodhouse went over to make it 25-23 in the 78th minute but Steele failed with a difficult attempt from out wide to halt Sarries’ brave fightback.
Their cause was also not helped by two yellow cards, to player coach Ali Thompson and second rower Lehan Koekemore, which at one stage meant they were down to 13 players.
Thompson admitted that switching off for five minutes had cost his side the chance of getting anything from the game. Exiles head coach Jan Venter, meanwhile, said he was happy his side pulled through.
Venter said: “It was tough and we were fortunate as Saracens have a good pack, but my team pulled through.”
Sarries counterpart Thompson added: “We switched off for five minutes and you can’t do that against Exiles backs with their speed.
“There were lots of good individual performances but we need to put the team performance together and get the backs and forwards to come together.”