RICHARD Hill had sympathy for his players as they battled freezing temperatures and torrential snow against Ospreys, but warned they needed to be smarter tactically if they encountered the same at Sale Sharks on Friday.

Snow fell throughout the 24-14 victory at Sixways and made handling tricky for both sets of players.

“I have talked to the players and they couldn’t feel their hands,” admitted Hill. “It’s easy for us to stand on the sidelines with gloves on, but they were frozen and you could see errors on both sides.

“The players spoke to me afterwards and said when they did catch the ball they didn’t know if they had or not — they had to see if it was stuck.

“It was hard to handle out there and consequently not much ball was going to go to the wings. The pack did well, the half-backs controlled it and Dale Rasmussen gave us go-forward in the middle.

“But we have got a bit of work to do because conditions could be like this up at Sale this week. I don’t think we played as well as we should have done in those conditions.

“To be fair, we haven’t really played in those kind of difficult conditions. But when you are playing against a press defence, like the Ospreys have, and it is snowing then there is a certain way you need to play.

“We didn’t quite do it. There were glimpses in the second-half that we had got it and we will have a good video analysis session to go through it all. We have got to play better and be smarter tactically in those conditions.”

Hill also paid tribute to the ‘remarkable’ home supporters at Sixways as a healthy crowd of 5,856 braved freezing temperatures to back the Warriors.

“The crowd was absolutely brilliant — they must be mad,” laughed Hill. “It was remarkable and they were really vocal as well. I was really delighted and the crowd was superb.

“The Ospreys couldn’t believe there were that many people to watch an LV= Cup match when there was no semi-final place up for grabs.

“What a fantastic turnout there was for the players and it made for a really great atmosphere.”