After seeing his young side surrender a 28-0 lead at halftime, Wales fought back bravely to score four second half tries but the damage had already been done as England recorded a 45-26 victory to condemn Wales to sixth position.
Talismanic fly half half, Cai Evans tried to put a positive spin on his final game at international U20 level when he said, “That was a tough result to take but at least we won the second half.”
The Welsh squad possessed plenty of fire power with the likes of Ryan Conbeer, Tomi Lewis, Rio Dyer and Deon Smith, but they were starved of ball in a tournament where Wales’ defence underpinned their sterling performances which featured wins against hosts Argentina and just a second scalp against perennial favourites, New Zealand.
The 5th-placed final was a curate’s egg for the Welsh youngsters. Twice the rampaging attack carved up ground, only to cough up possession and see the red rose brigade gallop downfield and score in the first half to gain the ascendancy – something they held with a vice-like grip thereafter.
Wales haven’t finished as high as 6th in the rankings since 2015 but even that little chink of light didn’t assuage Williams.
“There is a progression from that point of view I suppose but it’s difficult to hang your hat on that for me personally,” said Williams. “We came here to Argentina wanting to win games – we had the opportunity against England to come away with four wins from five games and we didn’t do that.”
He did however praise his young side for not throwing in the towel after the break.
“I was pleased with the second half – the boys showed some character there. We spoke at halftime about just getting a foothold in the game and I thought we did that really well. The story of the game really was giving them momentum – the first two tries came from our line breaks, it gave them momentum then which made it difficult for us.
“I thought we got that foothold in the second half when we pegged them back but let them off the hook with a charge down – taking the score out to 35 points and we were always chasing from that point – it would have been interesting if we were able to reel them back in but it wasn’t too be – the general view is we had a good crack at this World Cup – I’ve learnt a hell of a lot as a coach in my first year in this tournament and I can’t wait for next year’s now to be honest.”
With more than one string to his bow with the Welsh Rugby Union, as well as being head coach of the Wales U20 programme, he is also the WRU Head Coach of Transitional Players which means he has been in the perfect position to assess the future generation coming through the Welsh pathway.
“I’ve spoken a lot about the balance on how we view this programme as coaches – development is a key part of it,” he explained.
“Some players will move on to professional rugby with the regions and into senior rugby and their task is to challenge for places at the highest level domestically back home while others will have another opportunity to come back next year so the lessons we take from here will be key in moving those boys forward. And hopefully for me, supporting them back in the system back in Wales.
“We have a number of players from this group coming back next year and it’s important we gather the lessons we learned from this World Cup and make sure we don’t fall back in our progression in these boys’ development, that we can kick them on.
“It has been a brilliant experience for me as a coach, my first experience of it. Immersed with the boys on a day to day basis has been fantastic – the challenges of travelling and spending a long period of time in one place has been great, the welcome in Rosario was second to none – I’ve really enjoyed it and hungry for the next one to be honest.”
