For the neutral, the spectacle in Swansea was a great advert for the competition with tries a plenty and moments of magic involving two sides fighting tooth and nail for a place in the end-of-season top eight play-off placings.
A sumptuous attacking display saw the Ospreys lead 38-14 and 43-28 with Jones’ side threatening to be out of sight before a stunning Connacht comeback brought the Irish province to the brink of victory. The injury-hit Ospreys, to their credit, would rally and survive four additional minutes of added time in a frantic finale to celebrate the stunning win.
Ospreys wings Keelan Giles and Daniel Kasende would both score two tries each, whilst scrum-half Kieran Hardy and man-of-the-match Jack Walsh, who also had four assists, would also cross as fly-half Dan Edwards kicked 13 points.
Connacht flanker Shamus Hurley-Langton scored a brace for the visitors with further tries from wing Shayne Bolton, hooker Dave Heffernan, full-back Piers O’Conor and flanker Josh Murphy producing a grandstand finale.
In a tight found play-off race the Ospreys who started the day in 13th jump six places to seventh in the standings ahead of next weekend’s crucial derby with Scarlets in Llanelli.
Jones felt his player’s work rate earned the victory but now wants to improve collectively as a team on their defensive efforts.
“There is a lot of effort involved in the performance, the league table doesn’t lie, and it shows how competitive it is,” said Jones after the win.
“We’ve been chipping away at our results over the last eight to ten days and hopefully, now the boys are in a position where we can get something to really get our teeth stuck into to try and stay up there and keep climbing.
“It was crazy though, we let it get out of control ourselves and were part of the problem. The good thing was we had enough solutions in the game to get the job done.
“There were lots of positives to take, it’s now looking at whether we can win a game without having to score 43 points.
“It was more the collective effort tonight without the ball that we were frustrated with. I would rather focus on what we did well, than what we didn’t, and am not letting that get in the way of a bonus point win at home in front of our fans.
“It was pretty obvious what we didn’t and that was on the defensive side of the ball. It wasn’t poor all the time, just very inconsistent.
“When you play a team like Connacht, they will work out pretty quickly where you are vulnerable and go after it. They did and were ruthless.
“There are good learnings for us – there are a lot of tough tests to come, with a few good attacking teams. We are going to need to make sure we are back to what we have been previous to this game.
“We were good in parts, but we know with the challenges coming we need to be better.
“The good thing is we got a win – we picked up some injuries, but the boys are tough, and we have some very good replacements, a squad, and the next man will carry on where the previous one left off.
“There were some variations [with the injuries]. James Fender’s had a bump on the head, Kieran [Hardy] has had a twist to his knee so we’ve just having a look at that but he’s up walking around.
“Reuban [Morgan-Williams] has a shoulder issue; Tom Botha took a knee-on-knee issue. So we’re hopeful a lot of them will clear up over the next few days and a bit more but we could have certainly done without them for sure.
“He [Justin Tipuric] had a bit of back spasm in the first-half and was a little uncomfortable. We had Tristan [Davies] coming back from injury and for me, it was a no-brainer having a fit guy chomping at the bit, or a guy that is struggling.
“We are going to need the whole squad in the next couple of months so that was purely putting trust in the next guy.
“We now have to make sure we take the learning out of this game and look at training for this week and make sure the set-up is right for the Scarlets because they are a good side.”
[Lead image: Ospreys Rugby]
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