Leicester Tigers interim head coach Richard Wigglesworth spoke highly of Handre Pollard after his side claimed a 46-24 win over Bristol Bears in the Premiership.
Wigglesworth’s men started well and moved into a 15-10 lead courtesy of Ben Youngs and Anthony Watson tries to overpower Harry Thacker’s score for Bristol.
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The visitors would sneak a lead soon after the break as Gabriel Ibitoye crossed. However, Julian Montoya led the response with a brace of tries, whilst Pollard produced a moment of solo brilliance to score.
Harry Randall and Charlie Clare would trade tries in what was Tigers’ day.
🙌 Handre Pollard!! Wow! Just wow! #LEIvBRI pic.twitter.com/63fcygwNq6
— Planet Rugby (@PlanetRugby) March 25, 2023
“When he speaks, you listen”
The coach labelled Pollard as “world-class” not only on the day but for weeks and underlined that the Springbok is an asset to the team environment.
“He is everything you would expect from a world-class fly-half,” he said.
“He has got an intensity to him that when he speaks, you listen.
“He was really good today, he has been good for weeks. It is not just about what he does on a Saturday, it is about what he does in the week.
“Senior players are really driving the environment at the moment, they are grabbing hold of it and that makes the weeks go smoothly as they are more competitive.
“The whole squad is driving what we are doing and he personified that today. I thought he was really good.
“Parts of that performance were very good, especially in the second half. We were slightly off in a few areas, but the boys tightened them up and we found an advantage with all their injuries and brought it home.”
Decision went the wrong way
Meanwhile, Bristol boss Pat Lam admitted his side were not at their best, but he did feel Magnus Bradbury’s try should have stood.
He said: “We believed we scored a good try with Magnus, but it was ruled out.
“We will go through the review process. It is like an ankle tap, if you are not down you can get up and run.
“But we did score soon after that through Gabriel Ibitoye and we only have ourselves to blame for our indiscipline which we have been really good at over the last four weeks.
“It is never easy here, but we made it a bit more difficult for ourselves. I can’t fault the effort.
“We have prided ourselves over the last few weeks on building pressure by keeping the ball, but we were really loose today, that rain just as we came out made a difference and we kept turning the ball over.
“I was really proud of our scrum because we gave Leicester 10 scrum put-ins in the first half which tells the story of our mistakes.”