Wilson proud of squad’s heart

The defending champions ultimately proved too strong in the first-ever Monday night Guinness PRO14 fixture to be held at Scotstoun, yet Wilson believes the positives to be taken from the match will serve his squad well over the coming weeks.

“We don’t like losing at home, and Ryan Wilson spoke very well about that in the changing room post-match,” said the Glasgow boss.

“There were some positives to take out of that though. I thought we showed great character to come back into the game after trailing at half-time. They were more clinical than us and overpowered us a couple of times, but the players fought their way back into the game and we probably should have taken at least a point out of that game.

“I thought we played some good rugby and put them under pressure, we just need to be more clinical. Leinster are a quality side, but I thought we fronted up well – guys like Rob Harley I thought were excellent tonight, and we scored some good tries.”

With both sides missing a cast list of internationals to Scotland and Ireland camps respectively, Wilson’s squad depth was tested under the floodlights. However, the trail blazed by tonight’s opponents is one that the Warriors Head Coach is looking to emulate with his young charges.

“We had a couple of players playing out of position late on, and you’re asking someone like Hamish Bain to play a full 80 minutes in only his second game for us,” explained Wilson.

“Credit to Hamish, because I thought he was great tonight. We stuck to our task and got back into the game – we still felt we conceded a couple of soft scores, and we felt we made too many errors in the opposition 22, but there are positives to take.

“[Leinster’s depth] is an example of what we want to be building here, to be able to bring some of the younger boys through and increase our depth when our international players are away.

“There’ll be some lessons to learn along the way, but ultimately the fact that we’ve got these young Scottish-qualified players coming through and developing with us can only be a good thing in the long run.”