Super Rugby Pacific: Western Force coach Simon Cron reveals forwards battled gastro during Fijian Drua loss

Western Force coach Simon Cron has revealed a bout of gastro impacted player availability, but rued missed opportunities as his side’s loss to Fijian Drua pushed them further back in the finals race. With six games to go, the Force are 10 points adrift of the sixth-placed Crusaders — who they host on Saturday — after they fell 24-22 to the Drua in Lautoka. While all the focus was on the debut of former NRL star Zac Lomax, who showed flashes of his talent in a 20-minute showing off the bench, Cron revealed they had wanted to give the ex-State of Origin winger more time. Unfortunately, Cron said an illness which had affected some of their forwards meant they had to be careful with who they substituted and when they made those calls. “It was a bit of a juggling at the end there, we had a couple of guys who were going down with a bit of gastro, so we were holding Zac a little bit longer than we would like to,” he said. “We would have liked to get him on there earlier, but just with a couple of forwards (sick), we had a bit of a plan around being able to move one of our midfielders into the forwards if we ended up short, so we had to hold off until about the 20 minute mark (of the second-half.” Lock Darcy Swain, who was one of the Force’s best in last week’s win over the Reds, was not named due to illness and the Force’s social media content last week showed several players on the flight to Fiji wearing face masks. Flanker Jack Daly played just 20 minutes before being substituted due to a head injury assessment and did not return. Despite the sickness, the Force will be kicking themselves after an attempted comeback fell short despite a myriad of chances. Ben Donaldson, who entered the game kicking at 90 per cent, went 1-4 from the tee and skewed a late penalty which flew wide of the mark, while Kurtley Beale also missed a conversion from Will Harris’ late try which would have tied the game late. On three separate occasions, the Force got over the try-line but were unable to ground the ball, while the Drua’s ultimately decisive try in the 62nd minute came when Isikeli Rabitu intercepted a Beale pass in midfield. And after captain Jeremy Williams won a herculean ruck penalty at the death to regain possession after the Force had turned the ball over after the clock had struck 80 minutes, Donaldson found touch less than 30m out, but Nic Dolly’s line-out slipped through Franco Molina’s hands and the Fijians promptly ended the game. “The hardest part of reviewing the game will be the opportunities we created and didn’t take. We were maulling over the line twice, and somehow we went individual and went to ground,” Cron said. “In the first half, we put a lot of contestable kicks up, but we weren’t in the contests, you can’t give the Drua free ball like that. We’ve got to have a look at making sure somebody’s in the air with them. “As the game went on, the boys fought back really well. There was a lot of fight in the team to get themselves back in that game, and we had the opportunity to win it, and we didn’t execute. “The hardest part in that review will be the number of opportunities we created, but didn’t take.”