Ian Davies satisfied with Cornish Pirates outcome after tough battle with Doncaster Knights
Cornish Pirates head coach Ian Davies was satisfied with the result, but not all aspects of the performance, following yesterday's 31-18 victory over Doncaster Knights.
A solid display from Davies' men brought four tries and the bonus point at a wet and muddy Mennnaye Field to move his side into fourth place in the Championship.
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Ian Davies
It took two scores from hooker Darren Semmens and one apiece from Laurie McGlone and Matt Evans to see the Penzance side past the relegation-threatened South Yorkshire outfir.
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However, Davies said: "We can kid ourselves and say conditions stopped us from playing a fast-flowing Barbarians-type game but we haven't done that all year.
"The times we've looked good are when we've controlled possession, played a power game and that came to the fore again this time. The disappointing thing for me was some of our game management, in terms of what we were trying to do off our set-piece from the forwards and what the backs were doing with the kicking strategy.
"We got away with it a little bit and could of come unstuck. The journey for Doncaster, the conditions and their position in the league suddenly took its toll towards the end and we got on top a little bit."
The win puts Pirates firmly back in contention for the fourth and final Championship play-offs spot with eight league games to go.
"It was a potential banana skin for us, especially after the way we played in the first 50 minutes," said Davies.
"To get the bonus-point try was fantastic and we certainly didn't think we would get that when we saw the conditions here. We could only hope we would because of where Doncaster are in the league and the fact we were still smarting from a poor performance against Carmarthen Quins in the British and Irish Cup last month.
"We could have done without our rivals for fourth, Leeds, getting a bonus point against Newcastle this weekend, but we know it is going to be close all year."
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