Baxter offers few excuses

By Mark Stevens

Exeter Chiefs head coach Rob Baxter said he and his side would take Sunday's 29-24 defeat at Newcastle Falcons "on the chin" and look to bounce back when they play host to London Irish this Saturday.

A disappointed Baxter could only watch on as the Falcons recorded their first Aviva Premiership win in almost a year thanks to tries from Sinoti Sinoti, Tom Catterick and Noah Cato, as well as a 14-point haul from fly-half Juan-Pablo Socino.

Although the Chiefs played their part in a tough encounter - claiming tries of their own through Thomas Waldrom, Ben White and Henry Slade, alongside three penalties from Gareth Steenson - it was not enough to down the flying Falcons.

Afterwards, Baxter offered little excuse for his side's performance and instead reflected on a workmanlike display from the Northerners.

"I'm disappointed, of course, and I thought we were a little bit shoddy at times today," said Baxter."I think in the first half we did quite well against a strong wind, but at the same time we were still prepared to give us some soft defensive penalties and that allowed Newcastle to keep the scoreboard ticking over. We also slipped off a couple of tackles and let Newcastle carry over the top of us a couple of times which is something we haven;t done this season.

"Fair play to them they got some confidence from that and they played very well. Yes, they hung on at the end, but I don’t want to talk too much about what we got wrong really. It’s Newcastle’s day, they’ve won a Premiership game for the first time in a while and during the game that did a lot things to merit that."

Having led at the hour mark 24-17, the Chiefs could not quite replicate recent showings that had seen them claim back-to-back victories over Gloucester and Harlequins.

Baxter added: "I am big one for sitting in press conferences when we beat teams and saying rugby union is a game where you tend to get what you deserve. Today Newcastle deserved their win and we got the loss when you look at the 80 minutes. I'm not going to take too much away from them, but it's up to our guys to regroup this week, take this result on the chin, and look to bounce back in what we know will be another very tough Premiership game against London Irish next week."

Sunday's win helped the Falcons end a dismal losing streak in the Premiership, one which had dated back to early October last year when they overcame London Irish.

Baxter had warned pre-match that Dean Richards' side would be a tough nut to crack - and so it proved at Kingston Park as the home side recorded a priceless scalp.

"I am not going to give them the discredit to say we took the game light - because we didn’t," said Baxter. "We prepared very well this week, some of the things we did through the whole game were on the money. However, you have to take the 80 minutes as a package and when I sit down with the players, we'll talk about a number of things, including the the number of soft defensive penalties we gave away.

"in some ways that is a bigger marker of where you are as a team because it kind of says 'are we really going to grit our teeth here and be tough for these few minutes?'. For me, that is disappointing because ultimately that is what allows a game to become a close battle."