PLAY-OFF week two: As I said last week, we were ready to face the barrage from Bristol.

The first job of nine is done. We were, however, quite disappointed with how we played, but the most important thing at this stage is to win.

As expected, Bristol threw everything they had at us. After the first 20 minutes back in January, we found ourselves staring down the barrel.

Sunday’s game showed just how far we have come since then in terms of our defence. It was our effort in defence that ultimately won us the match.

For me at the back, I had to do very little in terms of organisation or even tackling. Every time I looked up, we had a strong line and were comfortable. That is now our minimum standard.

We needed our pack to front up and dominate their opposite men physically, not an easy job against some experienced campaigners. Luckily, our boys were more than up to the task.

Despite being pleased defensively, we were far from happy with our attack.

I was guilty on a couple of occasions of aimless kicks and we missed touch to relieve pressure at important times. These problems must and will be fixed as teams will punish us for these simple errors.

Another area where we were poor was in our ball retention. There were too many occasions where we coughed up possession in good attacking platforms.

If it hadn’t been for Miles Benjamin’s superb finishing skills, we would have suffered for not being clinical.

The win has had some shine taken off it with the loss of Pat Sanderson with a shoulder injury. As I write I am not aware of the extent of the damage, but we all wish Pat a speedy recovery.

He has been a huge asset for us this season and had found some top form recently. He will be missed but we are blessed in the back-row with some very capable replacements.

Sunday was another feisty game and we saw our key players targeted in off-the-ball antics.

The boys are all very professional and we won’t allow these things to put us off our game.

It is a shame there were so many cards, but it tested our resolve with 13 men on the pitch. It is also a shame Andy Goode has had his good looks dented with a Neil Best-style nose!

However, that is Bristol ticked off until we meet them at Sixways.

We now look ahead to face an impressive London Welsh side. Welsh brushed aside Nottingham in their opening play-off fixture by an impressive 48-26 margin.

Their ex-Warriors Nick Runciman and Simon Whatling played very well, grabbing a try each.

Welsh will test us more than Bristol in terms of their attacking flare and we can be sure these two players will be desperately wanting to spoil our run. Those who watched our recent league meeting will be well aware of the dangerous individuals we will face. We cannot afford to let them score as easily as they did back in February.

Saturday at Sixways will be an exciting day — we cannot wait to play such a high pressured game in front of our home fans. It is up to us now to keep the ball rolling and up our game considerably from our trip to the Memorial Stadium.