Rhys Barratt believes Wales under-20 can use this fallow week to their advantage, as they plot their bounce back following Friday’s defeat to England.
The Cardiff academy loosehead prop opened the scoring at Doncaster’s Castle Park, but Wales were unable to hold onto their lead as the hosts ran away with a 43-14 win.
Barratt’s club team-mate, Wales captain Alex Mann, was shown a red card after 30 minutes of action, which saw momentum swing in England’s favour.
As they prepare to bring their campaign to a close against France and Italy, the former Coleg y Cymoedd prop is confident Wales can build on the positives of their performance at Castle Park as they prepare to return home to Parc Eirias in a fortnight.
Barratt explained: “We can build from that because there were a lot of positives in that game.
“We can look back and review the footage in our week off, which is a massive week for us if we want to build.
“We want to keep building, get those one percenters right and go into the France game with confidence.
“Next week is massive for us, we’ll train hard on those little extras. That fallow week will be good for us. We’ll get the running meters in and we want to go to Colwyn Bay all guns blazing.”
Barratt registered his first score for Wales under-20 in Doncaster, powering over from short range to put Wales ahead in the early stages.
The prop insists Wales refuse to use Mann’s red card as an excuse for defeat but admits England’s growing momentum steered the hosts to victory.
“We started positively and came out of the blocks really fast. That’s our game,” he added.
“In terms of my try, that’s the structure we play to and had worked hard on it during the week. We executed it well.
“I won’t take any credit for it! The boys produced quick ball from the ruck and it was just a walk-over from there.
“Yes we were down to 14 men after the red card, but we still believed as a group that we could go on to win.
“We took the red card out of it, and didn’t think too much about that.
“We know Alex is a class player, and he knows that himself.
“England just picked up momentum after that, and when they managed that then we found it hard to stop them. They kept on growing and momentum just changes games.”