Richard Hill: Late flourish has lifted Worcester Warriors (From Worcester News)

Richard Hill: Late flourish has lifted Worcester Warriors

7:30pm Sunday 23rd September 2012 in Sport By Tom Guest, @tomguestWN #WENsport

RICHARD Hill praised his side’s character after an astonishing fightback at Franklin’s Gardens to take two points back to Sixways .

Four late tries ensured Warriors turned what looked set to be a demoralising defeat into a real positive as they prepare for Friday’s home clash with London Irish.

Head coach Hill said: “At 37-3 down, I was thinking it was going to be a difficult week before a big game, but that comeback lifted the morale in the dressing room.

“I am annoyed about the first-half — we got well and truly beaten — but we showed really good character to come back and score four tries.

“It was a special second-half for us and I was delighted. We played some good stuff and looked a good side.

“We put some attacking players on the field that can carve up. Jonny Arr is quick at nine, Josh Drauniniu has quick feet to beat people and Josh Matavesi opens up the midfield.

“We picked a side initially to try and cope with the heavy Northampton pack, to try and stop the scrum and the drive.

“That was the tactic but clearly that didn’t happen, we couldn’t cope with their scrum or line-out.

“Making those substitutions and bringing on players that we know have got a little bit more attacking flair seemed to do the trick.”

Hill added: “We are not a team that should be losing 25-3 against Northampton on their own ground — it was a very disappointing first-half. I think that was partly psychological.

“Northampton were very powerful up front, in the scrum and in the line-out and their runners were coming onto the play hard.

“If you are going to stop their power game you have to negate their scrum and line-out drive and get around the corner in defence to meet their big runners on or beyond the game-line. None of those three happened in the first-half.

“When their forwards are doing that, they have half-backs sitting in an armchair running the game.

“You cannot stop that and we were under the pump. We had to stop it at the source and didn’t do what we needed to in the first-half.”