Plenty of room for improvement but six points from two away games is a satisfactory start to the season.
After a topsy-turvy encounter with Leinster at the RDS on Saturday, where the Ospreys trailed by 10, led by 10, and then needed a late penalty from Dan Bigger to ensure it finished all-square, Forwards Coach Chris Gibbes was in a positive frame of mind post-match.
The draw meant that the Ospreys remain unbeaten two weeks in and sit in fourth place in the formative PRO12 table, in contrast to last season’s start when they lost the first three games, and Gibbes was quick to highlight the positives following the stalemate in Dublin while issuing a word of caution about the need to improve.
“First and foremost, that’s six points from two away games to start the season” said Gibbes.
“That’s very pleasing from a team perspective, even if performance wise we came up a bit short in some areas of our game tonight.
“The tenacity and the effort was awesome, that can’t be faulted. We had a few opportunities, and we took two of them, but we need to be better at securing field position and then making more of it once we’ve done that.
“Leinster are a good side, everybody knows that. They are really hard to stop when they build up momentum as we found out in the first quarter and then in the last 10 minutes when we let them take the initiative away from us, which was disappointing.
“We’ve got to look at the bigger picture though. We’ve come to the RDS looking to get a result and we are leaving with two points that could prove extremely valuable as the season progresses.
“We’ve had two away games against very difficult opposition and although it’s not been perfect by any means, we are heading in the right direction and are unbeaten with plenty of things to work on and improve. That’s a good position to be in.
“We’re looking forward to going back to the Liberty next week and facing Edinburgh on our home track. To be back home off the back of two decent results, we’d expect there to be a bit of a buzz about the place and everyone is looking forward to it.
“There was good and bad about our performance tonight. We tried to do a lot of things, some came off and some didn’t, some of the stuff we’ve been working on didn’t quite come off but there were a lot of positives about the performance.
“However you look at it, you can’t get away from the tenacity and character that we’ve shown in abundance. If we can retain that attitude and continue improving in certain areas each week then we can start to build something this season.”