Hill fires warning over Warriors yellow peril (From Worcester News)

Hill fires warning over Warriors yellow peril

10:00am Tuesday 8th January 2013 in Sport

Richard Hill.

RICHARD Hill admits he will be taking a hard-line approach with his Warriors players who let the team down with ill discipline.

When Andy Goode was yellow-carded in the 19-14 defeat to Leicester Tigers on Friday, he became Worcester’s 11th player to be sin-binned in the Aviva Premiership this term — a league high.

The fly-half’s absence, which was for dropping his knees into Tigers try-scorer Scott Hamilton, was costly as stand-in goal-kicker Chris Pennell missed two straightforward penalties that could have won the match.

Fed up with seeing his side playing with 14 men, head coach Hill has revealed he will be dishing out punishments for players who transgress when Warriors return to league action in February.

He said: “We are trying to educate the players and use the carrot rather than the stick — this is the third week of the carrot.

“It’s a culture and an education process, I can’t wave a magic wand — neither can Steve Lander — and suddenly our penalty count goes below 10 and we get no yellow cards.

“It is a process we have got to keep going through over the next few weeks. If we are still repeating the same offences in four to six weeks, then I have got to get my big stick out.

“I don’t want to give our players excuses. I could look through the video and say, ‘That was harsh’.

“But I will take the view that we are being penalised and we have got to cut it out. It will be a hard-line approach.

“I have tried the softly, softly approach, now I have got to say we must cut it out.

“I knew Leicester would be a challenge because they are very good at exerting pressure and getting penalties and yellow cards for the opposition through that pressure.

“This was going to be a test and Andy seems to make a habit of it against Leicester unfortunately.”

Meanwhile, Hill admits it will be tough to break into the Premiership top-six this season after the back-to-back defeats against Tigers and Sale Sharks.

He added: “In the last two games, although we picked up a bonus point against Sale and Leicester, we were looking to win both those to really catapult us into the top six. It’s not beyond the realms of possibility, but it will be a tough ask now.

“The crowd was very appreciative (after the Leicester match) and you could see that at the end of the game when they were cheering.

“They are disappointed and feel hard done by, but we didn’t close the game out. It’s no one else’s fault but our own. Hopefully it will make us angry and we will be better for it.”