Harrogate 28

Bradford & Bingley 29

A try from Joe Nau in the fourth minute of injury time booked the Bees' passage into the third round of the Powergen Cup.

For their victory over their National League Two opponents, the Bees are rewarded with a trip to former Zurich Premiership side Bristol Shoguns a week on Saturday.

Nau, whose switch to scrum half from the left wing for the last 20 minutes changed the match when the Bees were 28-12 down, got on the end of a superb 20-metre forward drive to clinch a famous victory.

But although the score came at the death of what was a classic cup-tie, the Bees had done more than enough for victory.

Their head coach Geoff Wappett said: "Any neutrals watching must have thought the team in yellow and black were the National Two side. We were superior in all our approach work and scored five well-worked tries.

"If we hadn't gifted Harrogate three tries in those spells after the kick-off and immediately after half-time, we would have won comfortably. But we are a Jekyll and Hyde outfit at the moment. We play some nice rugby, defend well and then give up the ball easily and sides are punishing us."

Harrogate appeared to have the game sewn up until Wappett moved the orthodox scrum half Matt Rhodes out to the wing and Nau to No 9.

Immediately the Bees got on the front foot and with the free-running Nau leading the charge, the Bees forwards began to knock holes in the Harrogate defence. An immediate beneficiary was wingman Richard Tafa, who burst over in the corner to bring the Bees to within two scores at 28-17.

The visiting supporters knew an upset was possible from this point on as Phil Greaves and Stuart Dixon showed their pedigree in the centre and flanker Kern Yates seemed to be the first man to every break down. Fittingly, it was skipper Tom Rhodes who crossed for a try in the 72nd minute, which set the Bees up for their final comeback.

Things hadn't begun well for them as tries from Parsons and Chris Horner, and a conversion from Lee Cholewa meant the home side were 12 points to the good within six minutes. Then Dixon was sin-binned for handing out his own justice to a Harrogate player lying offside on top of the ball.

However this adversity seemed to inspire the Bees as full back Joe Simpson danced over for two tries in the next ten minutes.

His second was an exquisite solo effort. He followed up his own kick and outpaced the defence to dot down near the posts. Rhodes added a simple conversion to bring the scores level.

The Bees lost a second player to a yellow card in the 37th minute when flanker Ian Judson infringed.

While he was absent, Harrogate got tries from Cholewa and Horner either side of half-time and a Cholewa penalty after 46 minutes made it 28-12.