Leicester director of rugby Richard Cockerill insists there is much more to come from the defending champions.
Tigers boss says results matter more than tries for now
After watching Leicester score their first Guinness Premiership win of the season, director of rugby Richard Cockerill insisted there is much more to come from the defending champions.
All the Tigers' points came from the boot of Jeremy Staunton, who kicked five penalties as they came back from their surprise loss at Sale to beat Harlequins 15-9 at The Stoop.
Cockerill said he was not concerned by the fact that Leicester have yet to score a try, pointing out that Staunton is their third-choice fly-half and had to forge a partnership with new inside centre Anthony Allen.
"We have had to work with the combination of Staunton and Allen, who weren't with us last year. That takes time to bed in and the accuracy is sometimes not what we would like it to be," said Cockerill.
"But you lose Toby Flood, Sam Vesty, Aaron Mauger and Alesana Tuilagi to injury and you are not going to be as fluid as you would like.
"People remember how we finished last season but it is not about being in championship-winning form now. We have to grind out the wins or the bonus points.
"With all respect to Staunton, any team down to their third choice 10 is going to be a little bit different.
"We needed to win because two away games is a tough start. We didn't play particularly well last week and two defeats on the bounce at the start would not have been great.
"Not scoring tries in two games is not great for us but it is about getting results. Last year we won five games away from home all year and we have one under the belt now.
"The point we got at Sale last week will be massive come the end of the season and Quins are a good side. They will turn teams over here.
"I thought the boys battled really well and kept their composure when we needed to.
"When we went 9-6 behind the tide was starting to turn but we got to grips with the game again."
For the taking
Harlequins had the game for the taking when they moved 9-6 ahead with three penalties from Nick Evans.
But they could not close out the victory and assistant coach Tony Diprose said: "Leicester forced us to defend for long periods and that probably told in the end.
"If we want to play with tempo we need to hold onto the ball for longer.
"We didn't close out the game. We went 9-6 up with 20 minutes to go but we didn't quite get our basics right and we lost a couple of scrums."
