IT was important Worcester Wolves responded against London Lions and they did just that.

A few home truths were told following the British Basketball League Trophy defeat to Bristol Flyers and I needed to see a reaction from the players.

There was no tougher game than London, who are one of the favourites for the title this year because of the team they’ve built.

There was the excitement with Zaire Taylor coming back as well so it was a massive game for the club and players.

I was delighted that, after a very slow start, we got back to our game plan and played some tough defence, and offensively, I thought we were excellent in the second-half to win 83-78.

Although there was a lot of attention on Zaire’s return, my focus was on what we were doing as a team.

Zaire hit nine out of the first 12 points and it could have been a long night but we had some outstanding performances ourselves.

That was no more evident than the efforts of Disraeli Lufadeju in the second-half, who did a tremendous job looking after Zaire.

Disraeli carried a lot of injuries last year and has worked very hard to get himself in proper shape to give himself a chance to play this season.

I have always thought it was just a matter of time for him to show the true potential that he has.

He came in against London last Friday and took his opportunity.

Not only did Disraeli do a fantastic job defensively on Zaire, he also scored 10 points at crucial stages of the game.

Those sort of things make the difference to the whole team. I’m really delighted for him and hopefully we can build on that moving forward.

Disraeli joined us last year from Medway Park Crusaders, the same club Kalil Irving was with, and both study at the University of Worcester.

Kalil has been doing a good job for the last two years and now Disraeli is coming to the fore.

He had a knee problem last year but hopefully this year he can stay fit, keep listening to what the coaches are telling him and go out there and play.

This weekend also sees our first double header of the season with Manchester Giants at the arena tomorrow evening (7.30pm) and a trip to Surrey United on Saturday (7pm).

This season we’ve been fortunate, or not, to have just played one game every weekend so it’s going to be interesting to see how the team reacts to having back-to-back games.

From my point of view, I like to be playing consistently and I’m sure the players do too so hopefully that’s going to work out well for us.