England chief backs Warriors (From Worcester News)

England chief backs Warriors

12:00pm Monday 3rd September 2012 in Sport By Tom Guest, @tomguestWN #WENsport

ENGLAND head coach Stuart Lancaster had encouraging words for Worcester Warriors fans after watching them narrowly lose the Aviva Premiership opener.

Bath snatched a 24-23 victory at Sixways with the last kick of Saturday’s game and Lancaster, though not overwhelmed by the quality of the contest, felt Worcester had been hard done by.

A James Percival try and six Andy Goode penalties were cancelled out by Olly Barkley’s eight successful kicks.

Speaking exclusively to your Worcester News after the final whistle, the Red Rose chief admitted: “Both sides looked as though they were still a little bit rusty, but Worcester were unlucky to lose the game.”

While Warriors head coach Richard Hill agreed his side should never have lost, he felt they were the architects of their own downfall.

He said: “There was a lack of composure at the end — all we had to do was claim the restart.

“There was some overanxiousness over who was going to take it and Andy Goode ended up kicking it when we needed to keep it for a minute and then kick it off the park.

“One of our players then infringed at the death, the touch judge gave the call and that killed us. It’s a game we should have won — we lost it ourselves.”

Warriors’ former England fly-half Goode felt more work was needed on Worcester’s work at the breakdown after the team conceded an avalanche of penalties.

He said: “To have been 15-6 up at half-time and lose at the death like that was heart-breaking, but there are new laws out there which both sides fell foul of.

“We will definitely look at the breakdown because we gave a lot of penalties away. “The tackler has got to roll away quicker, which we knew the referee would pick up, but that didn’t happen so we will have to address that.”

He added: “We’ll look at the video and will improve. “We’ve got to up our intensity and increase our concentration levels at times because, even at the last kick-off, we dropped the ball and then gave away a penalty.

“We’ve got to learn and learn fast because it’s a tough league.”