Cardiff dish out Boxing Day hammering as pressure builds on woeful Dragons

Cardiff handed the Dragons a Boxing Day hammering with a brutal first-half display at the Arms Park, racing in nine tries in a 55-21 victory.

Seven tries in the opening 40 minutes, including doubles for Rhys Carre, James Botham and Tomos Williams, meant the result was settled well before the half-time whistle in Cardiff.

Ben Thomas, Keiron Assiratti and Cam Winnett crossed for the Blue and Blacks' other tries, while the Dragons had Harri Keddie to thank for two of their scores in a defeat that firmly put pressure on Dragons head coach Dai Flanagan.

The first-half was where this festive derby was decided. For every synonym of superb you could throw at Cardiff for that first-half, you could probably use a range of antonyms to the same word in order to describe the Dragons' performance.

As Christmas classics reverberated around the Arms Park at half-time, you were left wondering, unfortunately, whether Flanagan would still be in charge of the Dragons the next time the songs are rolled out.

On the basis of this performance in the capital, there's a risk of not getting through a rendition of Auld Lang Syne while still being the man calling the shots at Rodney Parade. If there's one thing you know about this youthful Cardiff, it's that they'll give everything at the Arms Park.

The stray joke in the press box that the first time the Dragons showed any fight was early in the second-half when scrum-half Rhodri Williams had a bit of a scuffle with namesake and opposite number Tomos was probably one leftover from a Christmas cracker a day earlier. Put simply, the Dragons were never in danger of matching them, either in performance or intensity.

That much was evident from the moment Rio Dyer took Cam Winnett out in the air less than 30