Boss calls on team to raise their game

Boss Richard Hill called on his Warriors to regroup and bounce back after the disappointment of late defeat to London Wasps in the Aviva Premiership.

Warriors saw victory evade them in a dramatic finale at Sixways as the Londoners claimed a narrow a 14-12 victory.

Head Coach Hill pinpointed set piece issues as the major point to address and revealed he had no complaints with the end result.

But he urged his team to now pick themselves up and strive to improve immediately as Warriors begin to prepare for an away trip to the north east to face Newcastle Falcons next Friday.

“The result is fair,” claimed Hill. “I am disappointed for our players because they put a lot of work in and effort, but technically we were not good enough. We have got to learn and be much better.

“Up front we have got to guarantee set piece ball because when we go to Newcastle next week they have Euan Murray at tighthead and a powerful scrum, James Hudson at lock who will dominate the lineout and Jimmy Gopperth who will just put us back in our own third all evening.

“We have got some work to do and we have got to make sure our scrum, lineout and driving play is a lot better than it was tonight and give our half backs a better platform to work from.

“We want to play attacking rugby but you have to win the ball to attack more,” he added. “Wasps pinned us in our third for most of the first half and it’s difficult to get out when some of your kicking is poor.

“We conceded a couple of penalties of scrums and free kicks, plus we couldn’t get quality ball off the lineout. It is a simple game – you win your set piece and give yourself as platform.

“Wasps had an excellent platform and probably didn’t capitalise enough. I think if we had as much ball as that we would have wanted to score two or three tries.”

Hill did, however, had words of praise for scrum half Shaun Perry who played his first game in several weeks after battling back from a potentially serious knee injury.

“I thought Shaun was tremendous,” said Hill. “To actually do what he has done, after a two-week layoff, was absolutely superb and I thought he played a real whole-hearted game.

“Some of this kicking wasn’t the best in the first half, but you can excuse that when he hasn’t done much practice in the last few weeks.

“If his knee was not right he would not have lasted 80 minutes. He has come through and that is a big plus point for us.”


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