A brace of tries from scrum-half Grayson Hart and a third from fellow Kiwi Sam Beard secured a vital win for Alan Solomons’ men, denting the Osprey’s hopes of a semi-final spot.
Jeff Hassler replied with two tries of his own for the Ospreys but it was only enough for a losing bonus-point as the visitors failed to make their territorial advantage count in a tight encounter.
It was the Ospreys who struck first inside seven minutes at Edinburgh‘s temporary Meggetland home. Canadian winger Jeff Hassler latched onto Justin Tipuric’s slip-pass to crash over in the corner.
But Edinburgh replied immediately, Hart darted over for his second try of the season after a line-out was driven a full 20-metres. Carl Bezuidenhout added the conversion to put the home side 7-5 in front.
Beard then pounced for Edinburgh’s second try, Jack Cuthbert broke the line before feeding the former Bay of Plenty centre for an easy run-in.
Biggar, released by Wales for this match, kicked three points to put the Ospreys back in-touch before Hart touched down for his second try of the evening. The 14 men of Edinburgh lead 22-11 at the break.
Biggar again chipped away at Edinburgh’s lead with another penalty to get the Ospreys back within five points. But Bezuidenhout answered again to restore Edinburgh’s eight-point lead.
Hassler closed the gap to three points with 20-minutes remaining. The winger out-paced two opposition men to get on the end of Sam Davies’ kick through for his second try. The Ospreys slipped to their seventh defeat in eight visits to Scotland, but managed to salvage a losing bonus point in the last minute through Biggar’s boot.
