Western Force coach Simon Cron hopes his team's stunning 40-31 upset win over the Queensland Reds is just a taste of things to come.
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The Force ran in six tries - four in the first half alone - on the way to posting their first win of the Super Rugby Pacific season on Saturday night.
The victory was a huge confidence booster for the Force, who had started their campaign with four straight losses and had coughed up sizeable leads against the Rebels and Brumbies.
Cron was thrilled with his team's performance against the Reds, especially the first half when the Force led 28-5.
But he didn't like watching the Force concede 26 points in the second half to give the Reds a late sniff of victory.
"The good news there is we can still be better," Cron said.
"We don't want to let 31 points in. The boys will go again and they'll look at how we can make that better and not let it become that close.
"I still think there's upside to us. I don't think by any stretch of the imagination that will be our best performance.
"There's some good learnings to take out of tonight, but it's more enjoyable learning when you've won."
The Force are set to lose skipper Jeremy Williams for a period after he injured his calf in the first half against the Reds.
Back-rower Will Harris is also expected to miss next week's away clash with Fijian Drua with a suspected concussion.
Star Wallabies lock Izack Rodda is still sidelined by the quad injury he picked up on the eve of the season, but he's making steady progress from the setback.
"I think he's still a few weeks away," Cron said.
"He's still building back, but the light of the end of the tunnel for him is a lot closer than what it was, so he'd be excited too."
The Reds' second loss of the season dropped them from second to fifth on the ladder.
Queensland entered Saturday's match with lots of buzz about their exciting brand of high-scoring rugby, but coach Les Kiss was left to rue his team's poor first-half defensive display.
"We know we've got a lot more growth in us," Kiss said.
"We know that we're going to have to be better for 80 minutes rather than doing just good for 40.
"So we're under no illusions about this competition.
"I don't know if we needed the wake-up call. We haven't got ahead of ourselves, that's for sure.
"We've got a big one next week against the Brumbies, who are four from five now, so they're the team that everyone's talking about."
Australian Associated Press
