Match reaction: Andy Titterrell post Ospreys

Andy Titterrell gives his views after Wasps were narrowly beaten by Ospreys in the Anglo Welsh Cup. After the game, Assistant Forwards Coach Andy Titterrell said he was pleased by a number of individual performances but felt the collective didn’t function as well as they would have liked.

“I think we had an improvement from last week," he said. "Individually, the players who took to the field stepped up to the mark and played some good rugby but I think as a team, we were naïve in patches and that ultimately cost us the game.

“That Ospreys team is going to see them through the next four or five weeks in the Pro 12 but we knew that coming into the game, they were sitting at the top of the league and wanting to build some momentum going back into that competition next week. 

“When you have a home record like we have here, teams are going to want to come here and prove themselves against you. We’re very proud of our performances here. I thought that, considering we couldn’t qualify, there was amazing support today, a lot of people who came out to watch us and that goes to show how the club has grown in the last 18 months. We’re disappointed to lose, you should be as players and coaches, so we will go back and look at certain aspects of that game where we could’ve been better and work hard to put those right.

“It’s a great learning experience, but there comes a point where we can’t continue to have that learning process. Some of those young players you would like to think will begin to break into the first team on a regular basis, so as long as they continue to show improvements we’ll be happy.”

The game saw a number of key first-team personnel given some valuable game-time and Titterrell said he was pleased to see a number of players returning from injury perform well.

“It was good to see Simon McIntyre back with a little bit more game-time than he had last week and I thought he did exceptionally well. I thought James Gaskell in the back row certainly played well, especially considering he was out of position at number six. It was good to see Jake Cooper-Woolley come on at half-time and get 40 minutes of rugby under his belt after being out for a while.

“In terms of injuries, we’re in a pretty good place and we have a very competitive squad where everyone wants to play. We’ve had a few players come back to fitness the last few weeks, the likes of Jake Cooper-Woolley, Simon McIntyre and Kearnan Myall.”

The game also saw Carlo Festuccia make his first appearance since re-joining the club from Zebre Rugby.

“It was great to see Carlo Festuccia back out there and I thought he played exceptionally well, especially considering he hasn’t played a great deal recently. He came back into the squad this week relatively late, but it was like he’d never left. It was great to have him back and he has fitted in perfectly.”