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PWR: Chisholm faces questions on Quins' inconsistencies as round 3 approaches
By Lucy Lomax
This weekend Harlequins host Gloucester-Hartpury in round 3 of the PWR as the club celebrate 30 years since the formation of the first Harlequins Women’s team in 1995.
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The women in quarters finished third last season after missing out on a place in the final, losing in the semis to London rivals Saracens, who last weekend made Harlequins return to south west London with their tails between their legs after a humbling 47-10 loss at StoneX Stadium.
This week Quins head coach Ross Chisholm faced questions about emotional and performance inconsistencies, after a barn storming performance against Loughborough in round one scoring over 50 points, the team had no real answer to Saracens’ threats out wide or in defence, conceding almost the same number as they scored the week before.
One must remember that this is only the third week of the league and many players are still finding their feet post World Cup. Asked if he could put his finger on one specific area which could have been the reason for the blunt Quins performance – the timing of the bus ride in for example, the messaging pre-match, the warm up- the coach was unable to give one area, citing multiple reasons.
“The proof is in the pudding at how you perform at the weekend, and we need to take a look at a large chunk of stuff without going crazy,” said the Quins centurion in his second season as head coach with the club.
“It wasn’t the performance we were after, we made a lot of handling errors and our attack didn’t fire as we hoped. If we keep hold of the ball and finish a few of our opportunities then suddenly it’s a different story. There’s so many moving factors, it wont be just one thing, it’s important we don’t change the whole world because we won in round one.
“We did create opportunities and made line breaks and beat defenders so statistically we weren’t a million miles away from last week’s performance. I’d be worried if we weren’t creating opportunities. If you ship 19 points in the first 15-20 minutes it’s always going to be challenging.
“If we focus on the defensive side of the ball, it’s all really fixable. Every side in the PWR is really strong, I’m not going to get bogged down in what Gloucester are doing. Previous experience shows you they’re a top quality side and have been for a number of years and we’re under no illusions, it’s a great challenge for us to bounce back after the weekend.
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“From our perspective, how do we keep ball retention so we don’t have to defend as much, (ask) why were there line breaks down the edge, can we sure up down the middle which then protects our edges a little bit more?”
World Cup fatigue could be a factor with Quins’ match day 23 featuring players who played in the tournament from England, Scotland, Wales, Spain and Italy.
“They’re gone through six months of a really high intensity period, whether that be being selected for a World Cup, playing in a World Cup, not getting what you wanted out of a World Cup, or getting what you wanted, it’s not easy, it’s about recognising that and how do we manage that.
“We’ve had six months apart as this group of players and it’s going to take some time to reconnect and that’s my job to make sure we do that as quickly as possible.”
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Other fixtures this weekend sees Sale play Trailfinders, Loughborough play Exeter Chiefs and Bristol Bears play Saracens.
