A dire game, a dismal crowd and an increasingly desperate plight for Leeds Carnegie after five games back in the Guinness Premiership without a win. Staying up was never going to be easy, but, five points adrift at the foot of the table, it is already resembling mission improbable.

When Marco Wentzel, Leeds’s South African captain, burst through a ragged Gloucester line and Tom Denton, on his shoulder, supplied a powerful scoring flourish after two minutes, there was a suspicion that yesterday might be their day. That feeling did not persist long.

Gloucester were dragged down to Leeds’s level during a first half of extraordinary ineptitude, before choice words by Mike Tindall, the captain, and Bryan Redpath, the head coach, helped inspire a couple of training-ground moves that garnered them tries by Olivier Azam and James Simpson-Daniel in a decisive four minutes.

Andy Key, the Leeds director of rugby, was angry that a subsequent score by Jonny Hepworth that could have pulled back the home team to within a point was disallowed. “There was nothing wrong with it and I think the people in the middle have to understand what’s obstruction and poor defence,” he said. “Tindall stepped in to take Seru [Rabeni] from outside. That’s not obstruction.”

Key acknowledged that Leeds were also architects of their downfall with handling errors that bordered on the farcical. It was surely no coincidence that both teams started the day occupying the bottom spots. Gloucester were equally culpable before they recorded a second win, yet still blew any number of chances for a try-scoring bonus point. “I’m satisfied with the result,” Redpath said, “but at half-time I didn’t hide from telling them that sort of performance wasn’t acceptable.”

Tindall was one of the few players who could be exempted from criticism. Simpson-Daniel began brightly enough before he, too, suffered the yips. It was meagre fare for a paltry crowd, who seem to be voting with their feet at Headingley. That Leeds managed to withstand 20 minutes without conceding while Hendrie Fourie and Ceiron Thomas were in the sin-bin for professional fouls said more about Gloucester’s inability to string moves together.

Azam overhauled Leeds’s 10-6 interval lead, before Tindall followed up his dispatch of Simpson-Daniel with a 40-metre scoring charge, despite him suffering cramp en route.

Scorers: Leeds Carnegie: Try: Denton (2min). Conversion: Thomas. Penalty goal: Thomas (16). Gloucester: Tries: Azam (50), Simpson-Daniel (53), Tindall (80+4). Conversion: Robinson. Penalty goals: Robinson 3 (6, 14, 78).
Scoring sequence (Leeds first): 7-0, 7-3, 7-6, 10-6 (half-time), 10-13, 10-18, 10-21, 10-26.
Leeds Carnegie: J Goodridge; R Welding (rep: L Burrell, 35), J Hepworth, S Rabeni, L Blackett; C Thomas (sin-bin, 41-51), A Gomarsall (rep: S Mathie, 51); G Hardy (rep, A Moreno, 76), P Nilsen (rep: V Ma’asi, 59), J Gomez (rep: T McGee, 59), E Lund, M Wentzel, T Denton (rep: C Clark, 59), H Fourie (sin-bin, 32-40+2), A To’oala.
Gloucester: T Voyce; J Simpson-Daniel, M Tindall, E Fuimaono-Sapolu (rep: O Morgan, 11; F Burns, 38), L Vainikolo; N Robinson, R Lawson; A Dickinson, O Azam, P Doran-Jones (rep: P Capdevielle, 66), D Attwood (rep: P Buxton, 73), A Brown, A Strokosch, A Hazell (rep: A Qera, 44), A Eustace.
Referee: T Wigglesworth.
Attendance: 5,371.