Conor O'Shea has praised his second-string Harlequins side in the wake of their 23-7 LV= Cup victory over Cardiff on Sunday.
Quins boss 'proud' of young understudys after Cup win
Conor O'Shea has praised his second-string Harlequins side in the wake of their 23-7 LV= Cup victory over Cardiff on Sunday.
Quins were missing Nick Easter, Danny Care, Ugo Monye, skipper Chris Robshaw, Joe Marler, Mike Brown and George Robshaw, who are all on international duty with England and the Saxons.
But that did not stop O'Shea's young stand-ins securing a home semi-final against Newcastle with the win over a more experienced Blues outfit at the Stoop.
"I'm really, really proud of them," said the director of rugby. "We had a lot of young fellows out there against an experienced Cardiff side and we trusted the young guys.
"We had to defend a lot in the second half but our guys worked their proverbials off to help each other out. But when we turned the ball over we were really sharp."
O'Shea singled out Monye's 20-year-old understudy Sam Smith who finished off a magnificent move started by scrum-half Karl Dickson to score his seventh try in six matches.
"When you look at the workrate Sam put in to get on the end of that, he probably had a 95-metre run by the time he completed the whole thing - it was outstanding," he added.
Impressive
Dickson, who was deputising for Danny Care, England's replacement scrum-half in Wales on Friday, was also impressive during the clash.
"We're really looking to have two of the best scrum-halves, as a pairing, that any club could wish for," continued O'Shea.
"It's good for Danny when he's looking from his England hotel that he sees Dicko play like that."
Harlequins who are also currently in the Aviva Premiership's play-off zone and the quarter-finals of Europe's Amlin Challenge Cup have a good chance of picking up some silverware this season.
But O'Shea steadfastly refused to contemplate the possibility of the London club completing a treble.
"All we care about is setting performance standards," he said. "To me, winning everything, winning nothing is immaterial, if the boys put an effort in like they do, that's all they can do for each other.
"I'm just happy with the way they're going about their work at the moment and it's fun when you play like that."
