Jones frustrated after Ospreys fall to late Zebre defeat 

The Italians scored late to clinch a 23-19 victory to deny Ospreys a fine comeback after trailing 13-0 at the break. 

Zebre sealed victory flanker Samuele Locatelli going over in the last five minutes to add to scrum-half Alessandro Fusco’s first half score, with outside-half Giacomo da Re kicking 13 points. 

Ospreys scored three second-half tries through number eight Morgan Morse, centre Keiran Williams and fly-half Dan Edwards but it would be in vein as the hosts would take the win. 

A losing bonus point for Jones’ side guarantees Ospreys progress to the last-16 with one game to play, but they will now most likely have to overcome top of the table Montpellier in Bridgend next weekend to seal a favourable home knockout tie. 

“It’s very frustrating, we manifested a lot of the issues in the first-half and put ourselves on the back foot,” said Jones post-match. 

“We allowed Zebre to grow in confidence, however I thought we did really well at half-time to action quite a few of the issues from the breakdown and turnover rate. 

“We then started to attack in a way which we thought we would get some benefit out of it. We made six line breaks and only converted two. 

“Unfortunately, we were too loose and let those pressure moments off Zebre too often. 

“We know we didn’t get the first-half right. There was a lot of good intent, and we created opportunities offloading. 

“We knew they were going to be a threat at the breakdown and we tried to keep the ball alive to take that threat away. 

“But they just worked that little bit harder than us and got their second man, their jackler in quicker than we got our cleaner.  

“They then created some good moments in defense when they were looking vulnerable and turned them into positive moments going up the other end and scoring. 

“We knew it was coming and knew what we needed to do.” 

[Lead image: Ospreys Rugby]