Neil Powell says Sharks ‘not good enough’ in going down to Scarlets

Neil Powell says the Sharks were “all-round not good enough” in a loss to Scarlets that has dented their United Rugby Championship playoff chances.

Flyhalf Sam Costelow punished an ill-disciplined performance from the Durbanites with a perfect day off the kicking tee, as the Scarlets claimed a 32-20 victory in Wales on Saturday over a Sharks side that had welcomed a plethora of Springboks back from a training camp.

Aside from brief periods in each half, the Sharks never looked like winning the match, as many of the returning Boks struggled to shake off the rust and made plenty of errors on attack and defence.

Powell’s troops are now eighth on the URC standings and go into their final two home fixtures of the season under pressure, as the race for the URC playoffs heats up.

‘We let ourselves down’

Speaking post-match in Llanelli, the Sharks director of rugby told media: “It was obviously a disappointing performance from us and the result as well.

“It was again a game where we let ourselves down because of our ill-discipline. Again, [we conceded] too many penalties that we put ourselves under pressure.

“We also had unforced errors. We knew coming into this game that Scarlets were feeding off those opportunities and those scraps, and unfortunately, we gave them those scraps and they scored two of their tries off our mistakes.

“All-round not good enough, not clinical enough in this game and we’ve only got ourselves to blame.”

‘Individualistic performance’

The Sharks next meet URC foes Munster in the Champions Cup round of 16 at Kings Park on Saturday.

Powell added: “I also think it was a very individualistic performance by us. It feels like the guys tried hard individually but we didn’t try hard as a team.

“We will have to come together as a team over the next three or four days and make sure we bring a team performance against Munster and not an individualistic one.”

This story first appeared on sarugbymag.co.za. It is republished here with permission. For the original story, click here.