That’s better Coach wants to get Kingsholm rocking again
GLOUCESTER Rugby head coach George Skivington said he is looking to build a side to get Kingsholm rocking when fans can return next week.
He praised his side’s ‘outstanding’ defensive performance in their 40-24 victory over Wasps on Saturday to pick up their first win in the 2020/21 Gallagher Premiership season.
Skivington’s side bounced back from last week’s poor performance in the 38-15 defeat to Leicester Tigers to emphatically beat last season’s finalists at Kingsholm to go seventh in the table after just two rounds.
Captain Billy Twelvetrees scored 20 points as a superb second half performance from the hosts secured a 40-24 victory over Gallagher Premiership rivals Wasps at Kingsholm.
Gloucester’s eight were able to dominate against a Wasps’ pack missing England internationals Joe Launchbury and Jack Willis - and were rewarded with five tries.
Jack Singleton, Matt Garvey, Joe Simpson, Jason Woodward and Twelvetrees all crossed for the Cherry and Whites, with captain Twelvetrees adding three penalties and three conversions.
Paolo Odogwu scored two late tries for the visitors. Alfie Barbeary and Michael Le Bourgeois scored the others with Jimmy Gopperth kicking two conversions.
Wasps began brightly before a long punt from Gloucester scrum-half Joe Simpson secured his side a platform in the opposition 22 and from there the visitors were penalised only for Twelvetrees to miss a straightforward kick.
Minutes later, after a strong burst from centre, Mark Atkinson, Twelvetrees was presented with an even easier opportunity and this time the Gloucester skipper made no mistake with a simple penalty which was the only score of an evenly-contested first quarter
However it was largely a disjointed affair with the game not being helped by continual disruption with injuries - Prop Ben Harris left the field permanently and there were lengthy delays for treatment to other Wasps’ forwards, Tom Cruse and Tom Willis.
Despite these setbacks, Wasps took the lead when, from a line-out 10 metres from the hosts’ line, the ball went loose for Le Bourgeois to seize possession and score.
Gopperth surprisingly missed the conversion attempt before a period of sustained Gloucester pressure ended with Twelvetrees kicking his second penalty, before Singleton finished off a driving line-out to give the hosts a 13-5 interval lead.
Wasps lost Willis at half-time and three minutes after the restart they fell further behind to a third penalty from . Twelvetrees.
The visitors appeared to be struggling but they conjured up the next try. Skilful play from Thomas Young sent Josh Bassett racing away down the left flank before Barbeary forced his way over from close range - the flanker’s fifth try in seven matches.
The game continued to gain impetus with a second try in as many minutes, Gloucester responding when Garvey burst away from a maul 15 metres out.
Twelvetrees missed the conversion and then a penalty after Wasps’ replacement Levi Douglas was sinbinned for repeated team infringements.
Gloucester took advantage when Lloyd Evans burst away to feed Twelvetrees, who did not have the legs to make it to the line - but Simpson was onhand to receive the scoring pass.
With 13 minutes remaining, Woodward finished off an excellent threequarter move to pick up the bonus point, before Twelvetrees intercepted Gopperth’s pass to race away for the fifth.
Spirited Wasps controlled the
remainder of the game and after Ruan Ackermann was sin-binned, replacement Odogwu scored two tries in quick succession to secure a bonus point for the visitors.
The Gloucester coach praised the reaction from his players, saying: “It was a tough week for us and last weekend wasn’t what we were expecting. I think there was just a lot of honesty in the group and a lot of hard work.
“Today we got nearer to executing the sort of game plan that we want to do. I thought the energy was great and there was a group of lads out there that wanted to fight hard for each other.
“We went in with a plan last week and every time we got near executing the plan we made a very simple errors.
“Today we cut out the simple errors and put ourselves in positions to actually go for the plays that we had in place,” said Skivington.
Gloucester made 146 tackles against a dangerous Wasps side which helped the Cherry and Whites get a foot hold in the game and not allow the visitors to play the way they wanted.
Most notably, Ruan Ackermann was the hosts’ most industrious tackler making 21 throughout the game.
“I thought our defence was outstanding today. Dom Waldouck has done an outstanding job getting the boys organised and hungry to make tackles and embrace that part of the game.
“That was probably the deciding of it because obviously Wasps are a massive attacking threat, and we knew that.
“Our discipline in defence was probably the thing that got us out on top I thought.”
But the Gloucester head coach remains realistic, not wanting to get ahead of himself.
“We are just going game by game; we know we are a team that is building and shifting the emphasis on certain parts of the game.
“It is something that is going to take some time, that was by no means a perfect performance and there’s loads of things for us to go away and work on,” said Skivington.
“What was good was when something didn’t go well, they rolled their sleeves up and got on with the job and didn’t shirk away from trying to get back in the game.”
Kingsholm is set to welcome 2,000 fans next weekend when the Cherry and Whites face Harlequins with Gloucestershire placed in tier two of the governments Covid-19 restriction system. Skivington was disappointed that the Kingsholm faithful could not be there to witness a great afternoon for the club, but said: “We’re really excited for the fans to come back. Obviously, it is a great rugby place here and I see that away from the stadium.
“We want to give them a team that they can be proud of and I think they will have been proud of that today and it would’ve been great to have Kingsholm rocking behind the performance.”
Danny Cipriani was not included in Gloucester’s 23 and Skivington explained: “After last week’s defeat, we decided that we needed a whole week’s training.
“Danny was unable to train on Monday and Tuesday as was Lewis Ludlow so both were left out and Lewis was extremely disappointed not to play. In Danny’s absence I thought Lloyd Evans did a great job.”