Doncaster Knights: Positives and negatives in win over Nottingham

Doncaster Knights boss Clive Griffiths will take the positives from Saturday's 26-21 Championship win over Nottingham at Castle Park while not ignoring the negatives.
Knights' Latu Mafaaf  scores a try against Nottingham. Photo: gary LongbottomKnights' Latu Mafaaf  scores a try against Nottingham. Photo: gary Longbottom
Knights' Latu Mafaaf scores a try against Nottingham. Photo: gary Longbottom

“The positives are that we came from 12-0 down to win and the fact that we dominated the second half,” said the Welshman.

“We dug a hole for ourselves in the first half and trailed 18-11 but we turned things around in the second and I can’t remember them breaking our line.

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“It wasn’t pretty by any means and both our second- half tries came via a catch and drive - whereas most of our tries this season have been scored by the backs - but sometimes circumstances dictate that you have to win ugly.

“The negatives were the fact that we made the same sort of mistakes we made in the defeat at Ealing last time out despite having spent all week working to rectify them in training.”

Griffiths admitted that the Green and Whites scoring two early tries had not been in the pre-match plan.

Although Griffiths had issues with Nottingham’s first try – a 50 metre opportunist effort – he praised the ‘well-timed’ execution of the move which led to their second touchdown from a kick to the corner.

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He added: “We had identified areas where we felt we could exploit a weakness and the plan was to put pressure on them by doing certain things but that went out of the window after going 12-0 down.”

“We had a few selective words in the dressing room at half-time, and sometimes you’ve just got to do that, and we got the response that we were looking for.”