Steve Tandy has rubbished claims the Ospreys are a divided camp and pointed to the spirit shown in their victory at Northampton to back his stance.
The Ospreys coach heaped praise on his players after they kept alive faint hopes of progress in the European Champions Cup with a 43-32 win at Franklin’s Gardens.
It was the Ospreys’ first victory away from home in Europe for 10 years and followed two defeats that had opened their campaign in the tournament.
“Even though people on the outside question the group and suggest maybe we’re split, that changing room is really tight,” said Tandy.
“Even though they were bitterly disappointed with recent performances the group stayed tight and you get some senior people back – boys like Alun Wyn Jones, Dan Lydiate, Nicky Smith – they came in and really grasped the initiative.
“Bradley Davies has been outstanding throughout the working week, and these senior boys have dragged everyone else along with them to show what this team is about.
“It’s a pretty happy dressing room and we’ll enjoy the bus trip home but we’ll knuckle down again on Monday morning and look to build on this one. Northampton will be hurting to have conceded 40 at home, we felt that for ourselves a few weeks back, and they’ll want a reaction.
“That’s what these double headers are about. If you are the losing side in the first game you have an opportunity to put it right, if you are the winners then you want to use it as momentum, a platform, and that’s what we’ll have to do.
“It’s just one game, nobody will be getting carried away, but we’ve definitely shown in this pool that we can be competitive.”
Northampton’s hopes of reaching the knockout stages were all but ended as the Ospreys came out on top in an 11-try thriller.
The region had led 43-8 in the second half, but an impressive rally from the Saints saw them score four quick-fire tries to pull things back going into the final 10 minutes.
Tandy’s visitors were able to hang on and keep their European hopes alive following try doubles from 100-cap man Dan Evans and wing Jeff Hassler
The Saints now have only one win from from their last 10 games and this result heaped further pressure on beleaguered head coach Jim Mallinder.
Dylan Hartley, Nic Groom, Rob Horne, Ahsee Tuala and Harry Mallinder scored tries for Saints, but it failed to hide what was another abject result.
Ospreys scored through Tom Habberfield and Kieron Fonotia as they defied the setback of a late red card for Hanno Dirksen.
“It got a bit crazy, but for the first hour I thought we were pretty spot-on,” added Tandy.
“For the first 60 minutes, I thought we were pretty special, coming away from home against a tough team like Northampton. We silenced the crowd, I thought we controlled the game and we thought the game was dead and buried at 60 minutes, which was where we started to get a little bit loose.
“I thought we were so efficient, the half backs controlled the game really well and I thought that physically we really dominated the first hour.
“After that Northampton got a bit of momentum, the game did get a bit crazy, but ultimately we can enjoy the moment of coming away with a bonus-point win from Franklin’s Gardens which is pretty pleasing for us.
“We’ll definitely be tidying up a little bit on the last 20 minutes but we’ll also be focusing on what we did really well, how we controlled territory and then, if we can get our physical boys on the ball, I thought we were pretty smart. We looked like a team that was enjoying themselves tonight which was pleasing.”
