Head Coach Dai Flanagan called on Dragons to drive ‘energy and emotion’ back into performances after a 23-19 defeat to Emirates Lions in the BKT United Rugby Championship.
Taine Basham grabbed a try brace – making it three in two games - and back row partner Harri Keddie a score on his return to the starting line-up.
But despite outscoring the south Africans on try count, it was the Lions who claimed the points as the Men of Gwent suffered a narrow loss for a second consecutive weekend.
Dragons secured a losing bonus point, but Flanagan admitted it was an inaccurate and wasteful display that was not up to recent standards.
“It’s hard to reflect because that didn’t look like us, how we have played the last few weeks,” he said.
“We didn’t drive much energy and tempo in the game, it probably wasn’t a great one to watch for our supporters.
“When we reflect on the last three weeks, the one thing we have started to create is what we are proud of, an identity, and that didn’t look like us. That is as disappointing as the outcome.
“We caused our own issues,” he added. “The ball in play was extremely low in the first half, we had 12 scrums.
“We created more of a pushing contest and slow game not a running game. We need to reflect our inaccuracy and wastefulness.
“There are always positives, we are trying to build here and do it step by step, but fundamentally it is hard to take positives on the back of another narrow late loss at home.
“We’ve got to present in every moment and the try we conceded was similar to the one we conceded and cost us the game against Sharks last weekend.
“If we want to be a good team, because we have good individuals, we must stay present in those moments.”
Basham again turned heads with his double-try burst and Flanagan believes there is still much to come from his back row.
“Taine has been excellent since he has been back in,” he said. “He has massive work-ons, like everyone else at the club, and he can be so much better.
“We are seeing a really good Taine, but there is potential in there for him to be an excellent Taine.
“Like everyone else in that dressing room, he has got to knuckle down and get to work because we want better outcomes.”
Looking ahead to next weekend’s game with Benetton, Flanagan added: “We are very skinny as a squad at the moment, and we have a six-day turnaround against arguably an international team at Rodney Parade.
“We need to really drive the emotion, we need to drive the energy, and we need to start looking like ourselves a bit more.”
We need to really drive the emotion, we need to drive the energy, and we need to start looking like ourselves a bit more...
