Richard Cockerill tells his Edinburgh players to be proud of their win over Sale Sharks

For the first 40 minutes on Saturday night, this final fixture of the year for any Scottish team threatened to bring 2020 to a suitably miserable conclusion. Instead, an inspired second half produced an implausible comeback and a 16-15 victory over Sale that ensured Edinburgh will go into the New Year with justifiably renewed optimism.

Celebrations for Edinburgh as the full-time whistle sounds against Sale in the European Champions Cup match at the AJ Bell Stadium. Picture: Martin Rickett/PA Wire

Down 12-0 at the break after conceding two tries, one because of a lapse of concentration at a quickly taken lineout, the other because of a defensive error of judgement by Mark Bennett, Edinburgh were on the verge of elimination from the Champions Cup. But Bennett himself sparked the recovery with a try, Jaco van der Walt added 11 points with the boot, and Richard Cockerill’s team went home with a win that puts them in sixth place in Pool 1.

With two games to go it will still be an uphill battle to break into the top four and thus qualify for the last eight, but if Edinburgh remain within places five to eight they will at least enter the last 16 of the Challenge Cup as a consolation. More generally, after a difficult start to the PRO14 which has seen them win just two games from seven, they will return to league action next month in a far more confident frame of mind.

“We rode our luck a little bit, but we’re delighted with the win,” was head coach Cockerill’s verdict. “It keeps us in Europe and we should be proud of our performance and our effort against a good team.

“In the previous games we haven’t been playing that poorly. We’ve just made critical errors at critical times and that’s what I keep telling the players.”

In other words, inconsistency remains a costly problem. The defence can be excellent at times - against La Rochelle, for example, try-saving tackles by Stuart McInally and Bill Mata ensured their team picked up a losing bonus point - but is posted missing at others. The attack is incisive one moment, indecisive the next.

But what this match showed was that marginal gains can have a big impact. Tighten up at the back and you begin to frustrate your opponents. Be more assertive going forward and you begin to gain ground.

It was one such assertive moment by Hamish Watson that put the Sharks on the back foot and produced the half-chance that was all Bennett required to open Edinburgh’s account. Van der Walt’s conversion made it a one-score game and the spirit began to seep out of Sale, for whom Denny Solomona and Rohan Janse van Rensburg had scored tries in the first half, with Robert du Preez converting the former.

After two penalties from the Edinburgh stand-off, the home team did regain the lead with a Du Preez penalty which made it 15-13 around ten minutes from time, but Cockerill’s team were undeterred. A shoulder barge on Watson saw Jean-Luc du Preez sent to the bin, and Van der Walt calmly scored from the penalty.

The win, while narrow, was thoroughly deserved because of the way in which Edinburgh overcame their own flaws. Complete elimination of those flaws is unlikely, but a significant reduction of them in the coming months is by no means unachievable. And if that happens, a season that has been fraught so far may well become fruitful.