Head Coach Dai Flanagan called on his Dragons to have ‘composure in chaos’ after derby day defeat to Cardiff Rugby in the BKT United Rugby Championship clash at the Arms Park.
Dragons found themselves 14-0 down early in the capital but showed resolve to battle back to 21-14 in the final quarter.
But after pushing for a score to level the game up, Dragons were hit by a late try and left empty-handed.
“I felt we gave too many easy ins,” said Flanagan. “I don’t feel Cardiff had to do too much to get what they got. We’ve got to be better.
“We were fully in the game (at 21-14) and I was expecting us to kick on with the bench. But errors and penalties then hurt us.
“Within all the chaos we’ve got to show composure. I can’t talk enough about having that belief.
“Sometimes you can be really stressed, but at the same time clear.
“That’s my job, to make sure that we're training at that intensity and we're putting that much stress on a group in the week.
“It all comes back to having that composure and clarity in chaos,” he added.
“We were trying to dive in and get the ball back when sometimes we can just be patient and say: ‘we're comfortable here’.
“You see Cardiff have gone back 20 metres. We don't need to give the penalty away.
“That will come down to our training in the week. Are we creating enough scenarios like that to make sure people understand we're pretty good at this, we don't need to dive in?
“The last 15 minutes we were diving into stuff where we clearly didn’t need to.
“We could have stayed on our feet, held our spacings and got the turnover to go back down the other end.”
Dragons now face Ospreys on home soil at Rodney Parade next Sunday (kick-off 3pm) and Flanagan acknowledged the team now need to take their game up a level.
“The Ospreys are the flagbearers of Welsh rugby at the moment, so we have to improve all areas,” he said.
“There are loads in that game that we really like, lots we want to be associated with.
“The intensity we attacked with, how we moved the ball against a team like Cardiff who have a decent defence.
“But again, it goes back to the stuff we are not so good at and what we need to get better at.”
Within all the chaos we’ve got to show composure... I can’t talk enough about having that belief...
