Gibson proud of young Chiefs

Exeter Chiefs academy coach Rob Gibson has vowed to return even stronger next year after his young charges fell at the final hurdle.

The Exeter youngsters lost to their Northampton counterparts in the finale of Monday's Aviva Premiership U-18s Academy Finals at Allianz Park.
Northampton raced into a first-half lead but Gibson's side reeled them in - with tries from Jack Oulton, Ned Warne and Tommy Southworth - before slipping to a 31-19 defeat.

Gibson was immensely proud of his side's efforts across the season but he was still disappointed to fall on the wrong side of the result.

"We'll be back next year, stronger and better and looking forward to it again," he said. "The majority, maybe three quarters of this squad are eligible for another year. We've got a lot of 16 and 17 year olds in the squad so from that point of view the experience that the players have gained is just invaluable.

"Fair play to Northampton, they capitalised on the mistakes we made and scored the tries. But that's the level of competition we want to be playing.

"We're bitterly disappointed but showed such a great amount of pride in such a young side. I'm immensely proud. It's been all about the season for us. I'm disappointed tonight, it's always disappointing to lose. The fashion that we lost in, making errors was frustrating."

Exeter - the southern conference champions - rarely looked like winning the clash at Allianz Park as Northampton greatly impressed all evening.

But Gibson insisted fewer errors would have seen then competing from the first whistle to the last.

"I don't think it was nerves," he added. "We just didn't look after the ball in the right places and we didn't look after our territory, and so it cost us.

"We started to chase the game and throw a few offloads that were unnecessary, we got stripped in the tackle and that was disappointing - especially as we were dominant in the scrum.

"We had enough possession and at the start of the second half we controlled the territory but we let them off the hook and didn't nail Northampton down. But the lads will learn from it."