He saw his chip cleared off the line by Eardley before Gilks turned his effort over the bar.
Norwich were unable to apply the same pressure after the break, and Welbeck came close to a second when he collected a perfect Giggs through-ball but saw his chip cleared off the line by Zak Whitbread.
Hull striker Fraizer Campbell twice nearly equalised, heading Jarrod Bowen's cross narrowly wide before slicing a shot off target, while Grosicki saw his chip cleared off the line by John Obi Mikel with 12 minutes remaining before being denied by the woodwork late on.
Japan needed only a whiff of an opportunity to spark their breathless rugby into life, their first chance coming after just seven minutes when Kosei Ono slipped a tackle in his own half and chipped clear for Yoshikazu Fujita.
But his greatest love, apart from his family, was his land in Wellesley where he could be found in boots and goggles, covered in wood chips, clearing brush and riding a cherry-picker.
His only sixes for England came at Cardiff where the square boundaries are short, as opposed to Eden Gardens where the straight ones take a mere chip to clear.
A little chip just clears the fielder's head and the batsmen take two.
And yet... Opportunities fell to him but the Wigan goalkeeper Roy Carroll saved with his knees, his chest and his hands, then watched helplessly as a delicate chip just cleared his bar in the 90th minute.
The inevitable aggravation at traffic and ticket prices has been exacerbated by the efforts of LOCOG, the organizing committee for the Games, to defend the prerogatives of the Games' official corporate sponsors — a draconian overreach that culminated, last week, in police officers being forced to empty their packs of potato chips into clear polyurethane bags.
Wright then hit the post after the break and Amari Morgan-Smith's chip was cleared off the line by Matt Paine, before the dramatic final minutes.
