by Steve Diamond has expressed his delight after his Newcastle team secured a long-awaited Gallagher Premiership victory with a 24-18 win over Exeter at Kingston Park. With a hard-fought performance on Friday night, the Falcons ended a 25-game losing streak thanks to tries from Philip van der Walt and Jamie Blamire, who crossed twice, and a brilliant drop goal from Ethan Grayson.
The win was Newcastle’s first since March 2023 and advisory director of rugby Diamond was full of praise for his players. “I am delighted that the club has put its longest losing streak behind it,” he said. “We’re trying to build something. It takes time, but the task is to put together such performances at home.
“Away we’ll have problems sometimes with the team we have, but at home that’s exactly what I expect.” I saw it a little bit against Bristol, not against Leicester, but we simplified everything and tonight we got our first Stick to the plan.”
Exeter took the lead after just four minutes through Immanuel Feyi-Waboso, but Newcastle responded when van der Walt managed to reach over the line and bring the ball to the ground. Although two Josh Hodge penalties put the Chiefs back in front, Blamire scored twice either side of the break and Grayson’s drop goal gave the home side some breathing room.
Hodge crossed with two minutes remaining but Newcastle held on to secure a victory which Diamond described as “decisive”. He said: “We made a defensive mistake in the first five minutes when we got out of line, old Newcastle, and we fixed that.”
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“Then we looked quite comfortable, I thought. We struggled with the weather conditions and the wind, we couldn’t receive the high ball and that was what kept Exeter in the game in the first half. This didn’t get any better as the game progressed.
“So we know we still have something to work on. Our attack in the first half wasn’t as quick as we would have liked, so we were happy to be just ahead. (I’m) pleased, it was two teams fighting and it was an arm wrestling match. We had to keep at it and a win tonight was crucial for us to be able to compete with anyone in the league.”
The defeat was Exeter’s fifth of the season but five bonus points keep them one place ahead of Newcastle. Despite getting off to a good start, Chiefs struggled to build phases throughout the game and director of rugby Rob Baxter admits the team’s faith took a hit.
He said: “It’s difficult to talk about some things to do with the penalties we awarded, how poorly we were at clearing deficits, how easily we lost the ball, they are quite difficult.” I ask I imagine that some of these things are probably psychological, like the current position of the team and that little bit of belief.
“When you are strong and positive and know that everything seems to be working, somehow it does. You’re not conflicted, you just carry yourself nice and strong, you almost don’t force too much into things and things flow for you.
“I thought we were going to do that at the start of the half but we got distracted by our pace and our fair play against Newcastle, they got under our skin and stayed there.”
