Lacklustre Tigers seemed sluggish and ill-prepared

WELL, that was certainly painful!

Let’s start with the positives. Solomone Kata was a threat for Leicester all night until his worrying injury led to his withdrawal.

Even joining in with the forward pack in a rolling maul try, the Tongan certainly earned his pay on Friday.

That rolling maul provided Leicester’s main attacking threat and was largely unstoppable.

The return of Jack van Poortvliet was welcome and he injected pace from the breakdown.

He appears to have lost none of the skills that have made him a favourite at Mattioli Woods Welford Road.

Maybe with him and Kata in tandem, Leicester might have come away with what would have been an undeserved win.

Leicester did get four tries, so at least there was something in the league points for column.

There is the point that two more conversions and Leicester would have had the win but I, for one, never thought the match would be won given the performance of the two teams in even the first quarter.

Discussion of the negatives would take longer. Let’s bear in mind that this was arguably a lesser Gloucester side than the one that put the Tigers to the sword last week.

True, two new and improved halfbacks, but counter that with injuries to hooker McGuigan and captain Ludlow, and some players rested.

A genuinely horrendous match for Leicester in defence – 40 missed tackles and a 69 per cent tackle success rate would lead to questions in a Championship, or even third tier, side.

Given Leicester’s penchant for losing form during a rest period one wonders what is happening during the downtime at Oval Park.

The entire squad appeared to be sluggish and ill-prepared.

Naturally, the loss through illness of World Cup-winning fly half Handre Pollard affected preparation, but that didn’t entirely explain Leicester’s lacklustre production.

Tigers’ fans will almost certainly find themselves hoping this illness was one that was rife throughout the squad and Pollard was the most seriously affected.

The idea that this talented set of names can produce such a less than the sum of its parts performance is almost risible.

Without an almost inconceivable turnaround in form the play-offs are gone (and possibly even with such a turnaround.)

Newcastle have a new, belligerent head coach in Steve Diamond, and it would be a brave man to bet against the under-resourced Falcons pulling off a shocking win next week.