Bailey calls for togetherness within team ahead of Lowestoft trip

Old Streetonians head coach David Bailey is refusing to get too downbeat despite seeing his side slip to a third consecutive London Two North East defeat on Saturday, going down 25-10 at home to Saffron Walden.

Despite having plenty of possession in the game, Old Streets paid the price for not converting their pressure into points and were duly punished by Saffron Walden.

“Another defeat is disappointing,” said Bailey. “We were competitive for large parts of the game, but we conceded three soft tries, which has been the story of our season so far.

“I think the scoreline was fair and Saffron Walden deserved their win.

“We played okay, but we are still waiting on some of our better players to come back into the frame, but I feel that as a team we are slowly getting there.

“On the day, they were more organised than we were and that was the difference between the two sides I think.”

Bailey also believes that Old Streets’ performances on the pitch this season have been a consequence of what has or hasn’t happened in their Tuesday night training sessions.

“At the moment we are so disorganised because we aren’t training together,” he said. “Unless we can get together regularly and train as a team, then we aren’t going to become more stable and we won’t be able to progress.

“I have pretty much read the riot act to the team and hopefully they will respond to this.

“At the weekend, we were competitive, we didn’t get beaten off the park, but we weren’t really in the game either.

“Our teamwork is lacking at the moment, and that can only improve with togetherness on the training field.

One positive from the weekend for Bailey though, was the inclusion of fly half Alex Glover.

“Alex made a big difference, coming into the team,” said the coach.

“He is one of our better players and having him in the team meant that we could organise ourselves a little better.

“However in rugby, you need to be organised for 80 minutes, not for 40 or 50, which we were on Saturday.”

Despite the loss, Bailey remains optimistic that a full-strength Old Streets side could have beaten Saffron Walden.

“With a full team we could have beaten them, they are at a similar level to ourselves,” he added.

“We were solid in the scrum and lineout, but they took their chances and we didn’t.”

This weekend, Bailey’s men make the long trip to newly promoted Lowestoft.

“We know very little about them, but hopefully that can work in our favour and we can get our first points of the season this weekend.”