CARL FORSTER says the two points was all that mattered as North Wales Crusaders stretched their winning run in League One with a hard-fought success away to Cornwall.
Crusaders trailed by 10 points in the first half, but they turned things around to record a 16-10 outcome, which made it three wins on the bounce in the league ahead of this weekend's huge clash with play-off rivals Midlands Hurricanes.
Head coach Forster told Cru TV: "Story of the season. I'm not going to stand here and be negative.
"We've come all the way to Cornwall, preparation was good and at the end of the day, we got the two points.
"We were professional, but I think the story of our season when you look at the scoreboard.
"I think defensively outstanding. I was looking at the points yesterday and I think we're the third best in the league defensively, but I think it's our attacks let us down a little bit."
Having overcome Newcastle Thunder and Workington before getting the better of Cornwall, Crusaders are starting to find some form at an important stage of the campaign.
But they had to come from behind to beat Cornwall who took a seventh minute lead when Cam Brown scored in the corner.
A converted try allowed Cornwall to move 10-0 ahead, while North Wales eventually got on the scoresheet just before the break when Olly Davies finished off a move.
Crusaders trailed 10-4 at half-time and the second half was only two minutes old when Pat Ah Van touched down to cut the gap to just two points.
Cru went 14-10 ahead as Chris Barratt crashed over and Ah Van added the extras.
Ah Van kicked a late penalty as Crusaders confirmed their fifth victory of the campaign.
"Real clunky and good ball, but you come here and (it's) real tough," added Forster.
"You've got a lot of like union boys in the middle and this is with all respect in the world, it's just hard to play against.
"They make it really tough for you and, obviously, our skill set, I think we scored some nice tries, the middles linking up.
"We've put them through the middle and then it's been that last pass, myself included.
"It just fell short, but two points, that's what we came here to do and we've got it."
Reflecting on the tough nature of the contest, Forster added: "They slow the game down really well.
"Hands in the ruck, there's a few balls coming out and it makes a hard decision for the referee to guess if it's come out forcefully or not.
"I think that's what we've just got to be a little bit better at. I think when we play your Oldhams, as we've seen a few weeks ago, we raise our game and I think sometimes we just get dragged into that dogfight around the middle of the ruck and I think we just need to learn these lessons just to be a Crusader standard, which we've shown a few weeks ago, and to stick at that regardless who we play."
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