'By his own admission, he has not had the impact in games that he is capable of'
Wasps director of rugby Dai Young believes his side are still not safe from Gallagher Premiership relegation despite a crucial 28-16 bonus-point victory over Worcester.
Young’s troops are seventh after two tries from England number eight Nathan Hughes and one each by wing Marcus Watson and prop Zurabi Zhvania, along with four conversions from fly-half Lima Sopoaga, saw them home.
The Warriors remain just three points above basement team Newcastle after threatening a comeback but, ultimately, falling short.
Flanker Sam Lewis’ first-half try, along with a conversion and two penalties by fly-half Duncan Weir and a huge penalty from full-back Chris Pennell, was not enough.
It will take a disaster by Wasps and miracles from Worcester, Newcastle and others to cause Young’s side to come anywhere near the drop zone.
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However, the former British and Irish Lions prop is being cautious, particularly as his team face the top two – Exeter and Saracens – in the next few weeks.
Young said of relegation: “You would be silly not to have half an eye on it because it is still mathematically possible. We can look in front of us with a bit more confidence now than if we had lost.
“If we had lost, we would have been right in it and in a bit of a dogfight. I’m not going to be blase about it. I still feel we need at least another win to be comfortable but we can attack what is in front of us now.”
He did not want to pick out any individual performances afterwards, but said that Hughes has responded to “having a little bit of a poke in the eye” recently.
?? 23 carries
???? 54 metres
? 5 defenders beaten
?? 1 clean break
? 2 tries@NateWJHughes at his best today! ? pic.twitter.com/FPGWVUelQA
— Wasps Rugby (@WaspsRugby) April 6, 2019
Young said of the number eight’s man-of-the-match effort: “That’s the Nathan we like. His performances prior to this week probably have not been anywhere what we expect of him.
“By his own admission, he has not had the impact in games that he is capable of.”
Meanwhile, Worcester’s director of rugby Alan Solomons knows his side are in a fight for their Premiership status but insists they can stay up.
The Warriors boss said: “We are not the only club in that relegation battle. I am confident we can do it but we need to play well.
“If we play to the best of our ability, we will avoid the drop. But if you don’t play to the best of your ability, then you are going to have a problem and we certainly didn’t in the first 20 minutes of this game.”
That period saw Worcester go 21-3 down and they faced a mountain to get anything from the match.
“I know the momentum swung after this but I felt we could have defended a lot better than we did inside our 22,” said Solomons.
“I thought the tries came too easily. We were not really at the races in the first 20 minutes.”
Comments on RugbyPass
The author is 100% right. The Springboks know that they don't have near the natural attraction, mana, skill and mystic the All Blacks have. So, Chasing the sun 1 & 2 was concocted to overblow the Boks image on the back of a corruptly obtained “win". It's marketing ploy to force the Boks delusion as the World's Best. I guess World Rugby is also not to be believed when it came out with an apology about how the final was officiated. And if the 2023 final such a superb game by the Boks, then the Boks crying about Referee Bryce Lawrence for decades is also deserves a laugh. Chase the sun and get burned like a moth. A very well written literary piece that tore the Boks and Chasing the sun farce to shreds. 🖤All Blacks🏉
141 Go to commentsI’d say France was far more hard done by in the 2011 final than the All Blacks in this game. Joubert simply refused to call a penalty against the All Blacks in the last quarter even directing an All Black to drop a ball he picked up in an offside position rather than penalizing him. This article also totally discounts the efforts of PSTD. Ask Jordie how well he played. Or the backup flank who played hooker for the entire game. Siya was also a brilliant tackle by Richie from scoring a blinder. Pollard was also fantastic. Look I don’t like the boks style but the only thing more questionable than the content of this article is the timing of it. Get over it already
141 Go to commentsDad Marty was also a handy rugby player for Linwood back in the day. Great bloke. Sensational softball career.
2 Go to commentsWhat ifs are always dangerous. If you look at the game before Sam cane got sent of SA was dominating. You could make the argument the going down to 14 men rallied the troops and made them have to play to win which is always dangerous.
141 Go to commentsOmg… you are bruised And battered Benny. Stop crying … the scoreboard speaks. What a pathetic lover you are.. 🤣🤣🤣
141 Go to commentsPacific Lions, cry me a river
141 Go to commentsThis is the single worst piece of journalism I have ever seen since your last one. As a neutral, who really states that there should be an asterisk next to a win? You are an utter embarrassment to real AB fans, journalism and that joke of a house which pays you for this nonsense. Get a life, Ben.
141 Go to commentsGuys. Cancel the World Cup champions after this analysis. It changes everything. Ben knows. We’ll have to unengrave the Bokke off the trophy and hand it to the ABs, now that I’ve been enlightened about this illegitimate win. This needs to be done. Now!
141 Go to commentsBen is right here though, Springboks were woefully poor with the advantage they had throughout this game. The France match was heroic because that was an even contest this match had it taken place in Rugby Championship would have been an easy win for NZ. If anything this match should tell the Bok coaches that a lot of this team should be changed. They beat this same NZ team by record margin with the same circumstances but with a different core. They bring back the tried and tested guys and they nearly botch this game.
141 Go to commentsI knew who wrote this article from the first few words in the headline…lol. The red card actually did the ABs a favour. It galvanized them, only then did they step up a gear. Before that there was zero momentum.
141 Go to commentsFirstly the foul on Bongi was a planned move just like the NZ master plan with Bryce Lawrence you kiwis are filthy fux perhaps try to play a cleaner game next time I doubt that’s possible tho but don’t worry world rugby is on yr side they trying to take away all the BOKS strengths to help all you weakling as Jeremy Clarkson would say LA OO ZA ERR..🤣
141 Go to commentsAbsolutely spot on Ben. I certainly wouldn't gloat over a win like that. Frustrating as it is it's done and dusted and history will forever show the result.
141 Go to commentsHo hum.
141 Go to commentsNo question they were the better team. But that is the beauty of sport isn’t it!
141 Go to commentsEveryone is into Hurling in Ireland according to Porter, but only 11 of Ireland's 32 counties enter a team into the national competition. Same old blarney.
1 Go to commentsLet’s be honest. The draw and scheduling in the World Cup was a joke but South Africa found a way after having to go the hard (nearly impossible) way to the Cup Final via France and England. NZ had a hard game against France (lost) and had 5 weeks to prepare for the Quarter, 3 weeks knowing it was Ireland. NZ theerfore had to win one big game against an Irish team who played SA and then Scotland 7 days before. They won and it was de facto a semi final because they were playing a relatively weak Argentina team and it was a walk over. In the final a very rested NZ team was playing a very tired SA team and still lost. They couldn’t score more than 11 points. Put another way SA had to find a way to win while tired and they achieved that. NZ should thank their lucky stars that they fixed the scheduling in 2015 otherwise they would be dealing with a Bok treble.
141 Go to commentsPerhaps if Bongi wasn’t targeted and removed from the game in the first 3 minutes it would have been quite a different game. Maybe if NZ also faced the same competition the Boks faced to their win NZ would have looked quite different. The final score shows who outplayed who.
141 Go to commentsRubbish article! Abuladze played most of Exeters matches when fit. He got injured against Glasgow a while ago and is out for the rest of the season, thats why he hasnt played for Exeter and Georgia recently. Do some proper research next time!
1 Go to commentsGotta love it when kids throw their toys out the pram and can’t hack it with the grown ups debate. Here’s looking at you turlough! 😉🤣
148 Go to commentsThey lost the game period move on
141 Go to comments