Chiefs happy to return home after

what was a patchy performance.

The Chiefs fell well short of their high standards during the final leg of their road trip, playing with plenty of their usual menace but all too often missing the accuracy required to apply the final touch.

There were a multitude of offloads that didn’t quite go to hand, a number of incorrect options taken and, as a result, an abundance of attacks that amounted to nothing.

On another night, when the passes were sticking, it could have been a typically electric effort filled with typically outstanding tries. As it was, the Chiefs managed to cross only once, when Aaron Cruden carved a hole through the opposition defence and Liam Messam finished the job.

The Force did deserve some credit for refusing to wilt in the face of what, especially in the first half, was occasionally on onslaught. And they did do enough to head to halftime with the scores level, courtesy of captain Matt Hodgson’s try from a lineout drive.

But, in truth, they generally just had to wait for the Chiefs to prove their own undoing, with the home side’s missed tackles rendered moot by the visitors’ mistakes.

Some of them were glaring — like Siegfried Fisi’ihoi forgetting to take the ball with him as he crashed over the line late in the opening spell. Others were confounding — like Sam Cane over-hitting an ill-advised grubber to end one promising break.

But the majority of them were rudimentary, with the Chiefs regu- larly guilty of forcing their hand and failing to build pressure through phase play. To make matters worse, after undoubtedly hearing that message from their coach, they resumed after the break by finding new ways to contribute to their downfall.

It wasn’t as if they were showing serious signs of fatigue after their trip to Africa. Damian McKenzie, elusive and energetic throughout the match, offered no shortage of evidence to refute that explanation. But even McKenzie was guilty of ending his raids with errors.

Soon the Chiefs were wisely opting to find a lead in multiples of three but, while it was effective, that approach did leave them vulnerable, especially considering they continued to squander any strong