Head Coach Richard Hill hauled the power of the home pack as Worcester Warriors opened the new Aviva Premiership season with a 17-12 victory over Sale Sharks at Sixways.
The forwards dominated the visitors in the set piece and were awarded a second half penalty try as Worcester won on the opening day of a top-flight season for the first time in the club’s history.
Wing Miles Benjamin also crossed the whitewash while Andy Goode broke a league record as Hill was left with plenty to smile about after day one.
“The pack was awesome – the scrum dominated and the lineout was very good,” he said. “The two big back row ball carriers of Kai Horstmann and Neil Best were outstanding in their work rate and looking for the ball.
“That was exactly what was required and Shaun Perry at nine marshalled the pack superbly well, he kept talking and organising them. He did a great job.
“The backs made plenty of line breaks and that is encouraging. Errie Claassens, Dale Rasmussen, Alex Grove and Andy Goode all made them, but we didn’t quite finish them off. We failed to capitalise but it encouraging.
“If we can make line breaks in the three quarters then that is good, we have just got to learn to finish them off.
“It’s a very good start full of effort and enthusiasm,” he added. “We made mistakes, if we are honest, but we deserved to win. You look at your team at the end of it and think were we lucky or did we deserve it, and we definitely deserved to win that game.
“The first 20 minutes was fast and furious, it was a great opening half of rugby from both teams. We both showed excellent defence and the attack was ambitious.
“We turned the screw in the last 20 minutes of the first half and I felt we dominated. We got the try right at the end which we deserved it was important for us to go in at half-time with a lead.
“I felt we dominated most of the game in the second half and Kai Horstmann said to the team after the game that we should have won by 20 points. To be honest, we should have won by more and had a lot of opportunities to score.
“We lacked a bit of composure at the end when we needed to keep hold of the ball. We lost it and gave a couple of silly penalties with Alex Grove’s yellow card. One or two things crept in and with the clock ticking down, but that is something to learn.
“Games are tight and the margins are not going to be great in the Aviva Premiership. When we have got a lead like that we have got to be sensible to hold onto it.”