John Mulvihill was frustrated with his side’s slow start against Ulster on Friday, but believes there were promising signs to Cardiff Blues’ performance in Belfast.
Both sides had a share of the four tries at Kingspan Stadium, but the boot of John Cooney proved decisive as three penalties from the Irish international gave the hosts a nine-point win on a bitterly cold and wet evening.
Ulster racked up a 17-point lead at half time with Luke Marshall and Billy Burns crossing for early scores, but Cardiff Blues bounced back into the contest during the second half, with Aled Summerhill and Will Boyde dotting down.
Mulvihill says his side can take positives home from Northern Ireland, but insists they must perform for the full 80 minutes in order to get back to winning ways.
“It’s a very disappointed changing room. We didn’t give ourselves a chance in that first half,” said the head coach.
“There were too many basic errors and a few soft tries.
“In the second half, I thought we were pretty good. We held the ball pretty well and the gameplan was to hold onto the ball for longer periods of time in the right areas.
“We wanted to put pressure on Ulster to make errors in defence and force the referee to make decisions. That certainly happened in the second half, and we won the penalty count 12-6.
“The game came down to two tries each, and our set piece was more than a match for Ulster tonight.
“But if you give teams like Ulster and Glasgow points early on, it’s tough to play that chasing game for the rest of it.
“After being 17-points down in these conditions against a good Ulster team, it’s tough to come back from there but we gave ourselves a chance.
“We got within seven points but gave away a poor penalty and the two scores remained between the teams.”
Next up for Wales’ Capital Region are back-to-back home fixtures at Cardiff Arms Park, with Munster and Toyota Cheetahs the visitors.
Mulvihill is looking forward to returning to the Welsh capital, but is expecting a tough challenge against two of the PRO14’s in-form sides.
The Australian added: “We’ve had a tough start with three games away and only one at home, so we’re ready and excited to host Munster and Cheetahs over the next couple of weeks.
“They’re two teams that are on form and the both of them are top of the Conferences so it’s not going to get any easier.
“If Ulster kicked the ball well against us tonight, you’d expect the same plans to be coming down our channels from Munster next week.
“We need to dust off pretty quick, get back to training on Monday and get ourselves right.
“We’re not far from getting it right, but we’re still looking for a complete performance over 80 minutes.
“At the moment, we’re probably only getting a performance over 60 minutes, but we need those performances to start from the first whistle.
“It’s a frustration within the group but we’ve trained well over three good sessions during the week. We’ll review this, get back on the field.
“We don’t cough up too many points and teams do find it tough to score against us but we need to build more pressure with the ball and it’s something we’ll have to do against Munster next week.”