WARRIORS director of rugby Dean Ryan admitted he was disappointed his side failed to capitalise on an explosive start against Yorkshire Carnegie.

Three early tries helped Warriors into a 19-0 lead but they were made to work hard before they ran out 39-26 victors.

“There was a high level of performance in the first 20 minutes which put distance between us and them,” said Ryan.

“We are disappointed we didn’t kick on and make that a significant lead.

“I can’t speak highly enough of the at - tack but I am not going to hide away from the fact we need to underpin it with stronger foundations.

“At 19-0, to be told to get into the grind of the drive when you’re running riot around the field, you lose focus sometimes and I think that’s what happened to us.

“If it had been sat at 9-6 I don’t think we would have lost focus.

“We didn’t have an issue for the first 20 minutes and we have to find a way to maintain that clinical focus, because it was probably as strong an attacking per - formance as we’ve had for a long time.

“It was cohesive, everybody understood their roles and looked threatening, but we did not underpin it with solid forward foundations.

“The forward foundations were not strong enough for the standards that we’ve set.

“We did not get that part right and that’s what made the game more tense than it needed to be.

“We kept the ball as we played into the wind in the second-half and we looked sharp in attack. But we always looked vul - nerable to being marched down the field because we didn’t have a solid forward foundation.”

Ryan was delighted with the performances of Cooper Vuna, Max Stelling and Sam Smith.

“Cooper was dangerous,” he said.

“He was looking for the ball and got us on the front foot every time, even when there were lots of people around him.”

Vuna also joined in the scrum while Jonathan Thomas had a spell in the sin-bin.

“Cooper seemed to look like he knew what he was doing in the scrum,” said Ryan.

“He’s been in there once before.”

He added: “Stelling had one of his really strong games on the outside and Smith was great at the re-start and claimed high balls. I thought Andy Symons came on and straightened things up for us.”

The Warriors chief was pleased with the performance from Ryan Mills.

“Mills did a great job,” said Ryan.

“As a 12 he’s a different threat and is a second distributer so we can play wider and he’s immensely strong.

“We’ve got selection dilemmas over Symons, who straightens up and kicks goals, and Millsy, who distributes.

“There’s no doubt we will be looking at these combinations over the next few weeks.

“I don’t have any problems about whether it’s Lamby or Symo kicking at goal but, at the moment, Symo is in the seat. If Symo’s playing, then he will be kicking.”