‘Embarrassed’ Paul Gustard calls Harlequins showing against Worcester Warriors ‘one of the lowest points of my coaching career’

Quins conceded 26 unanswered points in a dismal first-half performance

Harlequins boss Paul Gustard admitted he was left embarrassed by his team’s woeful first-half display against Premiership opponents Worcester.

The Warriors blew a huge hole in Quins’ play-off ambitions by winning 29-14 at Sixways, but it was the first 40 minutes that left former England defence coach Gustard fuming after his side conceded 26 unanswered points.

“I am embarrassed. We never saw that coming,” Quins’ head of rugby Gustard said.

“That’s not to say we are an arrogant team and we think that we are going to dominate teams physically.

“But the team that we picked, we didn’t think we picked people that were going to get steam-rollered, but that’s exactly what happened.

“Our general play in the first-half, we got bullied when we carried the ball. We lost 25 percent of our lineout ball, and the story of the game was that we never got a foothold in it, because we didn’t control any territory.

“If you can’t function in the set-piece in rugby, it is a very tough game to play.

“Everyone is hurting. That first 40 minutes is one of the lowest points of my coaching career, I think.

“We never got to fire a shot, we were on the back foot all the time. It was a sobering 40 minutes for sure.”

Worcester’s forwards were in unstoppable form, with the Warriors scoring three first-half tries direct from driving mauls to underpin a first Premiership win of 2020.

Harlequins’ head of rugby Paul Gustard (Getty Images)

Number eight Cornell Du Preez, centre Ollie Lawrence and hooker Niall Annett all touched down before scrum-half Francois Hougaard’s 39th-minute score secured a bonus-point and Duncan Weir kicked three conversions before adding a second-half penalty.

Rudderless Quins, 11 points adrift of the play-offs before kick-off, could find no way back as Worcester comfortably ended a run of eight successive Premiership defeats despite conceding consolation tries to Chris Ashton and Elia Elia.

Worcester had not won in the league since beating Irish in December, but the performance gave them a considerable lift before they tackle runaway Premiership leaders Exeter at Sandy Park on Sunday.

Warriors rugby director Alan Solomons said: “I thought our defence was really good today, as was our scrum and lineout.

“It was important to get the win, and it is now a four-day turnaround before we face Exeter, who are an absolutely outstanding side, one hell of a side.

“But for us to get our first bonus-point win of the season today was exactly that – a bonus.”

PA