WARRIORS director of rugby Gary Gold has rallied his troops to deliver a better performance after ‘silly errors’ condemned them to a second consecutive Premiership defeat.
The Sixways side take on reigning Premiership champions Exeter Chiefs on Friday night (7.45pm) and Gold has called on his players to improve quickly.
Gold was left disappointed after watching his side fall 24-10 to Wasps at Sixways on Sunday following two late tries, which came as a result of losing crucial lineouts.
“We played pretty well until the final 20 minutes. I was proud of the huge amount of character the guys showed after having such an awful start injury-wise,” he said.
“We weren’t as bad as we were against Newcastle last week, but yet again we caused our own demise by losing crucial lineouts which Wasps scored from. We put ourselves under pressure and silly errors cost us. Against tops teams you pay the price.
“I don’t think our character is under question at the moment, there’s a lot of heart and passion, but we need to continue to work on our accuracy.
“Scrums became very difficult with Nick Schonert off. He’s a world-class tighthead prop so to lose him in the first minute was a blow. To then lose Tom (Heathcote) and Ben (Te’o) just accumulated too much for us. I’m very disappointed with the result but fair play to them (Wasps), they’re a quality outfit.
“To come away from a game at home without even a bonus point is crucial, but it’s a long season and we’ll continue to fight. We know we’ll get better and we’ve got a lot of guys to come back from injury.”
The Chiefs scored 105 points against Worcester across their two encounters last season and Gold admitted his side must show courage against a team which will try to ‘run all over them’.
“We’ve got to stay in this marathon and keep up with the pace. At this stage no-one is panicking but we have to be honest with ourselves and improve quickly,” he added.
“We would prefer to have a couple of more players available (for Exeter) but it is what it is.
“It’s been a tough start but we have to show courage and stay in the fight. Exeter are going to come here with a similar type of game (to Wasps) and try to run us all over the show.
“We must understand the enormity of the task coming.”