Searle racks up European hopes

BILLY

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CATCH ME IF YOU CAN: Billy Searle races through in the romp against Bayonne

(CAMERON SMITH / GETTY)

Searle scored a nine-minute hat-trick as Leicester cruised past Bayonne 57-14 to keep their Investec Champions Cup knockout hopes alive.

Searle, who was taken off on the hour, had contributed 25 points in a man-of-the-match performance against a heavily-rotated French side, whose ambitions for the season clearly lie away from this competition.

The visitors named nine players aged 20 or younger in their 23-man squad, and the inexperience was evident from the off.

Leicester had already sewn up the bonus point before halftime as flying wing Adam Radwan went over twice and Tommy Reffell and Cameron Henderson also crossed in a one-sided first 40 minutes which ended 24-0.

As if that wasn’t bad enough for the visitors, Tigers kept their foot on the gas in the second half, which turned into the Searle show as the fly-half waltzed in three times between the 48th and 57th minutes.

Together with his five conversions, the visitors would have been glad to see the back of him when he was replaced by Tom Whiteley on the hour.