DIRECTOR of Rugby Seb Reynolds slammed a ‘terrible’ 10 minutes as Rams fell to a 31-25 National One reverse at Dings Crusaders.
Having taken an early lead through a Max Hayman maul try, the visitors had Zach Clow sin-binned for a high tackle and shipped three converted tries to Evan Morris, Sam Cantwell and Harry Tarling.
Jimmy Halliwell then went over to make it 26-5 early in the second quarter, albeit Rams cut the gap with Ryan Lomas and Ellis Jones crossing before the break.
The visitors got within a score as Hayman doubled his tally, but Cantwell did the same before Henry Bartlett gave the away side hope with 11 minutes remaining.
But they were unable to complete the comeback and had to settle for two bonus-points at Shaftesbury Park.
Reynolds admitted: “Dings thoroughly deserved their win, and while there can be some criticisms of what we produced, it shouldn’t take away from what they did.
“They were very dangerous on the counter-attack early on, when they got in our half they looked a threat and they took their chances.
“We fell off tackles and at times both sides were poor when they were in their own half – it felt like points were coming every time.
“After half-an-hour we brought ourselves into the game and with the wind in the second half we felt like we could get the job done, but we weren’t able to build the pressure.”
Reflecting on the flurry of Dings points with Rams down to 14 men, the DoR continued: “We were terrible. We needed to tighten up, but unfortunately we went incredibly loose with off-loads, getting turned over in our own half, and we just didn’t manage that period well at all.
“For this young group, it will be a massive learning for their development.
“You could argue we should be learning quicker, but there’s been a shift in the last few weeks with new guys coming in and it’s still a discovery period for the group.
“They’re going to get things wrong, it was never going to be a case of learning within six months exactly what they should be doing, and part of that is learning which players will stand up.
“But there were definitely things we could have been better on.”
The defeat leaves Rams sixth in the table and nine points adrift of the play-off places, the top five separated by just six points following Rotherham Titans’ shock Yorkshire derby defeat at second-bottom Leeds Tykes.
And in the league which keeps on giving, Reynolds ended: “It’s been a wonderfully entertaining and at times frustrating first half of the season – we had a brilliant win at Rosslyn Park and at stages played some beautiful rugby against Dings – but ultimately we wanted to secure a victory for the supporters.
In the grand scheme of things, we’ve brought a lot of youngsters into the squad, they’re kicking on, and overall I think it’s been a positive opening block.”
Rams have a three-week festive break before welcoming old rivals Sale FC, the team one place above them in the standings, to Old Bath Road on Saturday, January 10 (3pm).
