AN angry Scott Naylor had some harsh things to say about his side’s second-half fade-out at Newcastle where they were once in a position of strength with a 22-6 lead.
That was the score after 32 minutes, but Thunder then turned the game upside down to win 28-22.
In three of their five league games, Roughyeds have failed to play for 80 minutes — they started badly and finished badly against Workington at home; in atrocious conditions at North Wales Crusaders they came good to win only in the last quarter of an hour; and at Kingston Park they produced some great rugby early on only to fall from grace with a mighty bump in the second half.
Said Naylor:
“For the first half hour we played our best rugby of the season. For the next 50 we were at our worst. I couldn’t believe it.
“To show such a transformation inside the 80 minutes of one game isn’t good enough. It was an important game against one of our major rivals at the top end of the division yet we go 22-6 up with half-time only eight minutes away and fail to keep them out until the break.
“That was a classic case of being unable to close a game down when we are in command.
“We had no maturity; no calmness; no ability to take stock of where we were in the game and to close it out.
“We did everything wrong from the moment we went 22-6 up after 32 minutes. We should have closed it down to half-time, but we didn’t.
“We spoke at half-time about what we needed to do and the we went out and did the exact opposite.
“They got the momentum and got a roll on and we couldn’t stem the tide because every time we got a crumb of comfort we threw it away by making stupid decisions or stupid errors. I also think Thunder got some help.
“We’d a couple of forwards missing but look, we had enough in the 17 to win this game comfortably. We proved that in the opening half an hour.
“It was exactly what we did against Workington, going points up, building a lead and then throwing it away.
“On the injury front, we have a few people feeling sorry for themselves, but we’ve nothing of note or of anything that’s going to keep them out of the Hunslet game.”
