Glasgow Warriors Head Coach Danny Wilson lamented his side’s inaccuracies at the breakdown as their slim hopes of making the Guiness PRO14 semi-finals were ended by Edinburgh.
Gavin Harper shares his thoughts and comments.
The hosts took control of the game after the break, with tries from scrum-halves Nic Groom and Charlie Shiel sealing a derby win, and booking Richard Cockerill’s side a place in the semi-finals.
Wilson, who was overseeing his first match since succeeding Dave Rennie as Glasgow boss, was left to rue their breakdown mishaps.
“There’s a couple of areas that we’ll look back on and be frustrated with,” he said post-match.
Glasgow Warriors lose to Edinburgh
“A lot of that was breakdown work – Edinburgh’s defensive breakdown was pretty accurate, our attacking breakdown, we got on the wrong side of the referee and gave away a few penalties there that stalled our momentum a little bit.”
He described both second half tries – which added to a first-half score by Groom after a lovely opportunist snipe at the breakdown, and 15 points off the boot of Man of the Match Jaco van der Walt – as “soft” and admitted his side will need to tighten up defensively.
“That’s two tries that we shouldn’t be conceding.
“They resulted from not getting out our own third, really. That was the difference, so a little bit frustrating.”
Defeat for Glasgow means next Friday’s reverse fixture at BT Murrayfield – set to be the first sporting occasion in the UK since lockdown to welcome fans – is essentially a dead rubber, with the 1872 Cup also lost this evening, but Wilson insisted that his side won’t be taking it lightly.
“It’s a derby so we’ll give it the full respect a derby deserves,” the former Cardiff Blues boss insisted.
“If there’s supporters at that match, that’s another reason to give it the respect it deserves.”
He is expected, though, to use the game to look at more of his squad and give players not involved this weekend a run-out.
“For me and the coaching group, we’ll maybe get a chance to look at some other combinations, and balance that with trying to win the game.”
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