Glasgow Warriors' Ali Price takes blame after drop-goal miss

Scrum-half Ali Price shouldered his share of the blame for Glasgow's failure to engineer a drop goal that may have snatched victory from the jaws of defeat on Saturday evening, but insisted that he will have learned from the experience, writes Duncan Smith.
Glasgow's Ali Price admits he is on a learning curve. Picture: SNS.Glasgow's Ali Price admits he is on a learning curve. Picture: SNS.
Glasgow's Ali Price admits he is on a learning curve. Picture: SNS.

The Warriors were pressing
hard to salvage a win after being hit by a late Munster try in the Pool 1 blockbuster to trail 14-12. The option of a drop kick was spurned and Price admitted that he and stand-off Finn Russell had regrets.

“Yes me and Finn talked about it after and looked at each other. It is just one of those things. Looking back now, should we have had a crack? Maybe,” said the 23-year-old.

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“But when you’re in the game and in the moment we just carried on playing. We eventually coughed up the ball. Could we have taken a shot? Yes, I guess we could have. We wanted to have a bit of ball in their 22 and get through the phases. We were confident we could break them down. I saw him back in the pocket. If the call was there I would have given it to him but in hindsight it’s easy.”

Glasgow are more often than not chasing try bonus points week in, week out and Russell
confessed that the art of the drop goal was something he had to work on after botching a couple of attempts in the November Test against Argentina but Price insisted it was something that was worked on in training.

“If we are in tight games we have got a drop goal routine or shape we form into,” said the scrum-half. “Maybe we should have gone into it. That’s on me and Finn as half-backs to organise that. But when we’re in their 22 I feel like we can break down any defence and ultimately get a try.

“I’m still learning the game. I’ve not been in many big matches like this. Finn has obviously got a bit more experience but we’re both young. You have to learn from these big games and I’ll be better for the experience certainly.”

Price added: “Everyone is pretty gutted. It was always going to be one of those games that was going to be an absolute battle right to the end. We’ll look over it on Monday and then head down to Leicester for what is a huge game.”