The Gwent region used 29 players and Hartpury 28 during an entertaining encounter which had 12 tries, six apiece, with the Gloucestershire out-fit winning 42-40 courtesy of a conversion from substitute outside-half Keillen Cullen in the dying minutes.
Dragons were without their big names and trailed 35-19 at half-time. They brought on more experience for the second half and fought back as Hartpury took off some of their starters.
“It was a really worthwhile game for us because you cannot replicate situations like that in training sessions. We’ve been working really hard in pre-season and there were things we did really well,” said matchday skipper George Nott.
“We’ll take a few lessons out of it as well. With a little bit of tweaking here and there I think we are going to be in a very good place.
“There were a lot of youngsters out there but none of them looked out of place. I was proud of the way they handled themselves and hopefully it will give them the hunger to go on and make their competitive debuts.
“We’re on a journey and the main thing in our mind is to be in a good place by the time we face the Ospreys on 21 September.”
It seemed Dragons would snatch the spoils as they racked up 21 unanswered points to lead 40-35 in the second half. But left-wing Ollie Holiday’s late score leveled matters, and the right boot of Cullen did the rest to leave th3 3,000+ home supporters wondering what might have been.
Hartpury brought a slick and smart game plan which exposed the heavier Dragons teams by moving the ball quickly and running on to it at pace. They had clearly done their homework by exposing Dragons’ soft defence against driving line outs, with four of Hartpury’s sextet of scores emanating from that facet.
Flanker Harry Short had been driven over for their first try, the second saw a penalty try awarded after a maul was pulled down illegally, while the third came after the ball broke loose and two quick passes put Jack Johnson over unopposed.
Johnson’s centre colleague Robbie Smith had earlier sprinted almost the length of the pitch for his score after intercepting a Dragons’ pass. Their fifth try was grabbed by hooker Ethan Hunt with impressive outside-half Harry Bazalgette converting them all.
Dragons’ right-wing Ewan Rosser touched down twice, the first a spectacular finish in the corner. Scrum-half Morgan Lloyd got the home side’s first following a break from flanker Evan Minto, with outside half Will Reed succeeding with two conversion attempts.
Reed then added the extras to tries from Minto and Wales U20 No 8 Owen Conquer to reduce the arrears to two points in the second half. Replacement scrum half Dane Blacker then stole away from the base of a ruck to put to score the try that put the Dragons back in front.
Reed converted for a 40-35 advantage, but Hartpury kept their cool and struck one more time through Holliday to snatch victory at the death.
