Head coach Giles Heagerty was left disappointed after his team travelled to second bottom Cinderford and failed to come away with anything. The Blues were picked apart in the first 25 minutes by a fluid Cinderford attack.
“I’m disappointed that performance. The first try was a little fluky but ultimately the tries have come from us missing tackles and you can’t miss tackles in national one. We’ve kept the ball in the second half, and it wasn’t pretty but we’ve shown we can grind things out. But overall I’m disappointed.”
The Blues certainly played a lot better in the second half and restricted the hosts to a single score after starving them of possession but Macc themselves struggled to break through a stern Cinderford defence.
“We talked about what we had to change at half time and the boys did that but we had opportunities to score but we made mistakes which stopped us from getting anywhere. Every time we put ourselves in a good position we turned the ball over which is unforgivable. A number of players had very poor games. We are in a position where we need things to click on a regular basis and that didn’t happen for us today.”
The Blues were without regular scrum half Jordan Brookes on Saturday as Tom Eaton replaced him at nine, but Ollie Chambers returned from his travels in Canada and filled a spot on the bench, Chambers came on at half time and certainly made a difference.
“We always planned to get him involved; he’s been away in Canada. It was a shame we had to get him involved as early as we did. He came on and he played superbly, he’s not been with us for 6-8 weeks and hes come in and played very well under pressure. Tom used to be a nine and he is capable of working there, its just a shame he got a bump early.”
The Blues face Fylde next weekend and Heagerty admits that his team must improve to avoid embarrassment.
“People are starting to feel sorry for themselves and there is no time for that, and I certainly do not have time for that. Its time for them to front up, we have a culture of no excuses and we need to get a grip of that, otherwise it could be a very tough day at the office.”
