THE players deserved all the criticism they received after their performance at Birmingham & Solihull on Saturday.

I watched the video of the game earlier this week and it was even worse second time around!

We drew the game 26-26 but the most disappointing aspect of the performance was the lack of desire among the players.

We had five kicks charged down, had numerous line-outs within 10 metres of their line and either knocked on or just lost the ball. Just really simple mistakes which I'm afraid is not good enough if you want to be the best. We are a professional team - we practice well over 100 line-outs a week!

There was very little pride shown by the players and certainly no toughness. It was a poor way to end the season because it reflected badly on the club.

Birmingham were obviously up for the game because they were battling for their futures in National One. The disappointing thing for me was that my players were also. Most of the contracts are up in the summer and this was their last opportunity to impress before we start negotiating new deals.

All I said to them at half-time was that this would probably be the last time they will all play together so they owed it to themselves to go out and perform. Players will want to move on and some will leave for other reasons in the coming months.

There will be no knee-jerk reactions by me or by the club. We certainly will not be making wholesale changes because that is where the club have gone wrong in the past - history tells us that.

We know we have to make some changes and there will obviously be some disappointed players but I don't envisage a mass clearout. I would say we would like to bring in three or four players for key positions in the summer but before we can do that there is the matter of making sure we keep our players at the club.

I want to keep players such as Andy Higgins, Scott Barrow and Sateki Tuipulotu but, after missing out on promotion, it is not going to be easy because there are interested parties. Certainly if we want to be successful and get into the top flight, we need to hang on these players.

People will be surprised at the calibre of players who are coming to the club in the summer and I think it is an exciting time at Sixways. We need leadership on the pitch to go out there and play the game-plan. The guys we are chatting to are experienced Premiership players and I think they will make a difference to us next season.

Rotherham will be a tough test for us next season because they have been used to the intensity of the Premiership all year. However, we will be stronger next season and more determined to reach our goal of promotion. It has been a good season and at the start of it, if people had turned around and asked me if I would take just two losses then I would have taken it. It is just a pity that we weren't consistent enough over the season.

I've really enjoyed myself this season at Worcester. We have put so much in place and the foundations for next season are so much stronger. The pressure will be on again to win the title but I think we will be more than capable of living up to that and finally getting into the Premiership.