'Proud' Smith sees positives in defeat to Sharks

REACTION: Glasgow Warriors head coach Franco Smith highlighted the positives he took after his side’s 24-28 defeat to the Sharks in the United Rugby Championship at Kings Park.

Smith particularly highlighted the fight his side showed towards the end of the match when the result was out of reach for them.

The Warriors scored two late tries that ensured that they got two bonus-points from the match – one for losing within seven points and one for scoring four tries.

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“I’m really encouraged by the fact that we kept playing, that is the type of people that work and play and I’m really proud of the effort until the very end.” Smith said.

He added: “Suddenly the two conversions makes a big difference of the two tries – we could just as well drawn the game.

“I felt they did well to contain us, they didn’t give us any lineouts or set-piece starters – we had three lineouts in the whole first-half.”

Smith subtlety touched on his thoughts of the officiating of the match but again backed his side for how they handled those match situations.

“We didn’t get the rub of the green from the referees perspective, we got penalised and we didn’t get any penalties off them so we ended up defending a lot in our own half the first part of the game.

“But with the limited opportunities we had in the first-half we scored some really nice tries.

“Again I think we showed in the last five minutes that if teams are going to allow us to play we are really good at it so a lot to be proud of.

“The whole team would’ve learnt something from playing against top quality players, the Springboks that we faced tonight were good for the Sharks.

“They played way better than I thought they would be because of the time away, they actually played really well therefore it makes our performance for a good point of reference for the rest of the season.”

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Smith gave his view on replacement Gregor Brown’s yellow card in the 65th minute for a what was deemed as dangerous tackle.

“I felt for me on the video it didn’t look like a yellow card to be honest so it did influence us a little bit, but as a collective we stepped up so I’m not too worried about that fact.

“There’s always going to be adversity in a game and the way we managed that period was good enough.

The Glasgow Warriors head coach confirmed that some players took knocks in the match, but that there are no injuries they are aware of that will affect their planning for their next match against the Stormers.

“There’s a lot of bangs but it was a classic ‘international’ game where the best of South Africa played the best of Scotland and you’ll always have some knocks, but nothing that currently will change what we planned for next week.”

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Smith concluded with providing insight on what Glasgow’s approach was so far in terms of the use of player personnel and that they will have to box smart in terms of their time ahead of their clash against the Stormers.

“I think the confidence in our process continues growing.

“It was good from our perspective to swop the team often to get a lot of players minutes under the belt and enough players ready for Scotland in a couple of weeks time.

“We’ve used 35 players now and I think that was important but now the continuity from this week into next week is going to be really important, it should make a big difference on the preparations.

“Also the time we have is limited so this week is all going to be about continuity and obviously there’s a lot of positive lessons to take ahead.”