Exeter coach Pellow states Premiership Rugby Cup wins have ‘rebuilt confidence’

Exeter’s successful run in the Premiership Rugby Cup has “rebuilt the confidence” of the squad, according to coach Ricky Pellow. This follows their 31-7 victory over Gloucester at Kingsholm, where they scored five tries. The Chiefs demonstrated strong form with a 31-7 win against Gloucester on Friday, securing victories in all three of their pool stage matches during the recent international break. Prior to this competition, the club had experienced a challenging start to the season, having lost a club-record six consecutive Premiership fixtures. Skills coach Pellow, who oversees the cup team, informed BBC Radio Devon, “What this block has done is it has rebuilt the confidence.” He elaborated, “When you lose six you are going to be a little bit dented and I think what this period has done is probably put some paper over those cracks.” Pellow added, “What we’ve got to do now is fill the cracks and rebuild and keep growing.” Exeter is scheduled to resume league play on Saturday with a challenging away game against Premiership leaders Bath. Their upcoming schedule also includes a trip to South Africa to play Sharks in Durban in the European Champions Cup, followed by hosting French side Toulouse at home next month. The Chiefs currently sit second-from-bottom in the league standings, a position maintained due to their bonus points, having suffered a defeat to bottom-placed Newcastle last month. “We’ve talked about it in the week and we’ll talk about it going into next week, what exciting games we’ve got coming forward,” Pellow stated. He continued, “They’re not games that we need to be worried about and change or go back into our shells; these are games that we’ve got to go out to attack.” Pellow concluded, “We’ve got to go out to South Africa, then we’ve got Toulouse. These games now are probably made for how we want to be as a team moving forward, that we’re going to fight for every part of the pitch and have a group that’s going to work together.”