London Irish director of rugby Brian Smith is adamant the 31-9 scoreline flattered Leicester after the Exiles suffered another loss on Saturday.
Tigers built an early 14-0 lead before the Exiles managed to find a way back into matters. But a penalty from Toby Flood and two late converted scores gave Leicester a handsome win on paper.
"I'm really disappointed as we came up short again. I'm proud of the boys' effort and we deserved a bonus point, so to come away with nothing was harsh," said Smith after the loss.
"The third try was the game-breaker for us. There were clear hands in the ruck to wrestle the ball free to give Leicester their opportunity and when the penalty try was awarded it was game set and match."
Smith also lamented the fact that England hooker Tom Youngs was not punished for his charge into a ruck.
"Tom Youngs shouldn't have played the full 80 minutes," said Smith.
"There were no arms involved and it was a shoulder charge which nearly took Declan Danaher's head off. It was perhaps a red-card offence and the citing commissioner will have to have a look at it."
Comments
lawynd says...
@TVaddict - it's not so much the circumstances that the club finds itself in, more the way Smith bemoans everything instead of being honest. Somewhere between Smith and John Mitchell's approaches is a happy medium!
For what it's worth, I don't think Irish will go down; that honour will be Sale's I believe. And getting rid of a lot of the overseas (and overpaid) players will do your team good in the long run.
Posted 08:50 24th December 2012
TVaddict says...
@lawynd
To be fair to Brian I don't think many coaches could cope with losing so many talented first team players in the matter of two years. It's basically a new team this year and we'll be lucky to stay up. However, the benefit is that we're bring a lot of young English talent through which will hopefully help us, and England, long term, much like Wasps.
Posted 18:28 23rd December 2012
lawynd says...
Smith is fast proving that his 'pedigree' with England wasn't a one-off, and there are excuses every time Irish lose. Which is a lot. Irish lay over the ball at every ruck throughout the game and had hands in on plenty of occasions, yet he has the temerity to bemoan the one occasion Leicester rumbled them at their own game? And Youngs hit the ruck hard, might have deserved a yellow for it...but Danaher was again all over the ball when he had no right to it. Your words are rather hollow, Brian...accept that your team isn't good enough and work on fixing that.
Posted 10:04 23rd December 2012