Falcons fight, but fade away late on
DAVE Walder admitted Newcastle Falcons ‘fell away’ after putting table-topping Leicester Tigers under huge pressure at Kingston Park.
It was a hard-fought victory for the visitors, for whom Nemani Nadolo, Guy Porter and Freddie Steward all scored, with George McGuigan grabbing the Falcons’ only try.
Walder, who will take over from Dean Richards as head coach at the end of the season, said: “It was a good game and we battled hard.
“I think you can see that in the last 15 minutes we fell away a little bit because of the effort we put in for the first 65 minutes.
“We spoke before the game about the players leaving and how we wanted to do them proud and to a man we did that today.
“We’re happy with the performance and the pride the lads showed but at the same time we are disappointed with another loss.
“There were a couple of key moments - we were held up over the line twice and the cameras didn’t go in our favour.
“Our lads are convinced they scored them but that’s the way it goes.
“As the game wore on Leicester just took a couple more of the chances which came their way and went for the bonus point, which is why they are top of the league.”
Tigers’ head coach Steve Borthwick saluted his players’ battling spirit.
Walder’s hosts had Leicester under pressure for extended periods and Borthwick admitted resilience was what hauled the Tigers over the line.
The former England skipper said: “From just before half time and then just after half time I thought Newcastle were really good.
“They put us under an enormous amount of pressure.
“I was pleased that we stood firm for the majority of it and then came back to finish the game strongly.
“I thought it was a tough game and Newcastle played a very, very good game.
“We knew we were going to work hard for 80 minutes to get what we wanted and that’s what we did today.
“I thought we started really well in that opening 20 minutes but we didn’t get the points we deserved.
“It’s a challenge in training to keep the boys fresh when we have a game one week then off the next and so on.
“We need to keep pushing through to try and get things better and start preparing for the game against Wasps.”
Leicester came flying out of the blocks and took an early lead when Nadolo barged his way over from close range.
The Falcons were soon reduced to 14 men when Adam Brocklebank was sent to the sin bin before Ellis Genge was denied a try by TMO.
The hosts started the second half strongly and claimed their first points when McGuigan bundled over.
Leicester bounced back as Porter’s try, followed by Steward’s in the corner, fired Borthwick’s team to a 19th Premiership win of the season.