Marcelo Loffreda reckons his side's early exit from the Heineken Cup will boost their hopes of retaining the Premiership title.
Tigers focus on domestic glory
Leicester Tigers head coach Marcelo Loffreda reckons his side's early exit from the Heineken Cup will boost their hopes of retaining the Premiership title.
Last week the Tigers missed out on a place in the last eight in Europe for the first time since 2004 and responded with a 41-14 thrashing of Newcastle Falcons.
That lifts them up to second in the table, setting up a top of the table showdown at Gloucester a week on Saturday.
Loffreda believes the loss at Edinburgh that ultimately cost his side dearly in Europe could prove to be the season's turning point domestically.
"We had to come back from that," said the Argentinian. "That was the challenge and we have to be very satisfied.
"We have to focus on what we can achieve and build our confidence and we are doing that really well.
"We tried to be consistent and build on last week and we were really good."
Poor start
Newcastle director of rugby John Fletcher blamed his side's poor start for ultimate defeat at Welford Road.
Newcastle shipped two tries inside the opening 12 minutes and there was no way back.
Fletcher said: "We didn't get out of the blocks. We needed a good start and we got off to the worst possible start.
"We conceded a couple of early tries and Leicester's not a good place to be chasing.
"We gave them far too much space, they got points on the board and built momentum.
"I couldn't wait for half-time, so we could regroup."
Toby Flood did cross for the visitors three minutes after the restart to hand them a lifeline, but Leicester replied within two minutes and went on to grab a bonus point.
Fletcher added: "We created some half chances after that in the second half but lacked that bit of precision."
