Errors, injuries take toll on Edinburgh
DUNCAN Weir and Duncan Hodge both lamented Edinburgh’s spiralling error count as a third PRO12 defeat on the bounce on Friday night threatened to send their league campaign into freefall.
If ever a win were needed, it is at Myreside on Friday, when Cardiff Blues will visit to launch what promises to be a wonderful weekend of rugby in the capital. But the search for the next four points is all that concerns the Edinburgh stand-off.
Weir was one of only a handful of players to emerge from a bruising second half with their reputations unblemished in a 39-10 defeat at Leinster, but a cruel night of injuries certainly impacted on his side’s ability to perform.
Both Tom Brown and Jack Cosgrove were forced off with suspected concussions, while Hodge confirmed there were a number of others struggling after 80 minutes in Dublin, with the tunnel resembling a casualty ward afterwards.
But it could have been a very different outcome had Edinburgh managed to convert some of their first-half dominance into scores. Instead Leinster’s Barry Daly ran in the only try of the half and Edinburgh somehow trailed 8-3 at the interval after controlling most of the territory and possession. After that there was only one team on the front foot, as Leinster ran in a further five tries.
“At the final whistle, being 25 points away from the Leinster scoreline is disappointing,” Weir said. “The first half was hugely positive, albeit we had the wind behind us and we could play down in their half a bit easier than in the second half.
“But we let ourselves down with our error count. Just simple things. We lost the set-piece battle in the second half, which gave Leinster a lot of momentum. Don’t get me wrong, they are a quality outfit, they sniff out any try and they execute.
“So we can learn a lot from the way they execute once they create chances. Because we had opportunities out there – it was just that final pass or the final couple of phases before we could really break them down.”
What first appeared to be a shocking missed chance before the half-time interval when Brown knocked on with the try-line at his mercy, proved to be for good reason when it was revealed the winger had previously sustained a knock to the head.
Weir was sympathetic to his team-mate’s plight, but said the mistakes were widespread around the team and that they must be eradicated as soon as possible.
He said: “Even that last play in the first half, just dropping that ball. I know Tom wasn’t the full shilling with his head, he had taken a wee bang. But he will still be disappointed by that.
“But it’s not an individual thing, it’s all collective errors. There are errors across the board and not everyone had the perfect game. No, we need to do a wee bit of soul searching and make sure we can learn from our mistakes.
“The Cardiff game is huge. The city will be buzzing with the international the day after, so it will be a similar atmosphere to that Ireland weekend when we hosted Munster.
“We came up just short that day, and we hope to right a few wrongs. That’s three defeats in a row, so we need to try to get the scorelines back in our favour.”