Dai Young was frustrated to see his side come away empty-handed following Saturday’s defeat to Connacht.
The Galway outfit ran in six tries to secure their place in the URC top eight, bringing Cardiff’s hopes of a play-off spot to an end in the process.
The Blue and Blacks replied with three scores of their own, courtesy of Seb Davies and a Thomas Young brace, but it wasn’t enough to come away with a bonus point that could've proven crucial in the race for the Welsh Shield.
Former Wales international, Young, was disappointed to see his side paying the price for missed opportunities and a difficult opening 30 minutes.
“You're obviously always disappointed when you lose. We knew we were up against a good Connacht team and they haven’t lost too many here [in Galway],” said the Director of Rugby.
“They’re on something like six winning games on the bounce so we knew that we had to be at our best, but we weren’t tonight.
“We were a little bit unlucky not to come away with four tries. We got ourselves in the positions but squandered them so well kick ourselves with that.
“But the tale of the game was the first 30 minutes. The penalty count was something like seven to one in that time and with the wind behind them, they were camped inside our 22 for the first 30 minutes.
“They got themselves three tries and it was uphill from there.
“The referee had a poor game in my opinion, to be quite honest, but it wasn’t the reason why we lost because Connacht were the better team.
“But in the tackle area, you had people off their feet and not releasing, which meant we had slow ball and couldn’t really get our game going.
“We’ll look at ourselves, but in the first 30 minutes we conceded seven penalties, of which there were two scrum penalties when the touch judge is blatantly calling against green and we still get it against us.
“So we’re scratching our heads on some of the decisions but Connacht were the better team who deserved to win.
“We should’ve at least scored four tries but we’ll dust ourselves off. You’ve got to look for an 80 minute performance tonight. It was 12-all in the second half, and a lot better in the second half, but we gave ourselves a mountain to climb.”
With the season coming to a close with a decisive clash against Ospreys at Judgement Day next week, Young added: “It’s a cup final, isn’t it? Both teams want to play at the top table next season and both teams want to obviously finish the season as the best place Welsh team, so it’s all to play for.”