WORCESTER Warriors' Steve Diamond admitted that a "lack of concentration" from winger Perry Humphreys proved costly in the second-half during the 36-12 defeat at Sale Sharks.

The centurion for the day was sent to the sin-bin in the 55th minute after a cynical pull on Sale's Aaron Reed denied a try-scoring opportunity with the game in the balance at 17-12.

Sale scored two tries in that period and boss Diamond was left frustrated at full-time but ultimately conceded that his side were not good enough on the day.

"I thought we were in it first-half," said Diamond

"They wore us down in the end. A lack of concentration for the yellow card and that knocked the cork out the bottle and they got some ascendency during that period and we couldn't get back in the game after that.

"The yellow card was unnecessary, we had it covered. But against good side like Sale you will take your punishment."

Diamond helped build the majority of this Sale side during his many years at the helm and knew that is was likely to be a punishing afternoon physically, which proved to be true.

Tom Dodd, Kyle Hatherell and Sam Lewis all came off the pitch with injuries during a tough 80 minutes.

"It was a tough game and there are some sore bodies in there after the game," added Diamond.

"I thought the players did well, it sounds silly when we've been beaten by 30 points but I think the commitment to cause is good.

"Against a side like Sale you don't want to run into their forwards and the state of the bodies after the game is testament to that."

The conditions were not favourable for a running game of rugby and Worcester played with the wind first-half and did well with it to lead 12-10 at half-time.

But after the break they struggled to play into the wind and errors did not help their cause.

"We knew we had to kick well here to keep it away from the forwards and we played well first half but then we turned around second-half against the wind, and a couple of unforced errors saw us down in our 22 a lot," continued Diamond.

"Then the subs for Sale made a big difference.

"It's one of those days where you cant say much to the players but we just weren't good enough, but the players did what they could.

"I am disappointed but there are bigger fish to fry for us. We have to get basics right and we will continue to work on that.

"We had positives today but for us it's back to the drawing board."