Waldrom wants to build on wins

Thomas Waldrom says it's vital the Exeter Chiefs continue to keep moving forward after an encouraging start to the 2014/15 Aviva Premiership season.

The Chiefs notched up their third win in four starts on Sunday when they overcame Harlequins 36-13 at Sandy Park.

Summer signing Waldrom claimed Exeter's opening try at the weekend - and took his own season tally to three as he touched down alongside skipper Jack Yeandle and centre Henry Slade.

Fly-half Gareth Steenson added a further 15 points, whilst two more monster penalties from Slade helped to complete the job on the Londoners, who replied with a converted try from Asaeli Tikirotuma and two penalties from Ben Botica.

For Waldrom, though, the importance of building on their previous win at Gloucester and rectifying the narrow loss at home to Leicester Tigers were key ingredients of what was a very solid display from Rob Baxter's side.

“We’ve been working hard for the last four weeks. We came very close against Tigers, we had a close run against Gloucester and it was a good performance today," he said. “We need to take confidence going forward now.

Sunday's victory lifted the Chiefs back up to fourth place in the Premiership and the all-action forward knows the key to maintaining a position in the higher echelons of the table is to back up wins, continuing this weekend up at lowly Newcastle Falcons.

“We’ve got to follow it up,” he added. “We said after the first week that we had to keep taking steps forward and it’s the same again now.

“We haven’t had to take a backward step yet and reassess too many things. So long as we keep building and doing what we’re doing week in, week out we should be healthy and go out next weekend and put in another good performance.”

Although only a few months into his Exeter career, Waldrom has proved a huge success  and the 31-year-old credits  Baxter and the Chiefs’ style of play for helping him settle into life at Sandy Park so quickly.

“It’s been amazing,” he said. “I have settled really well, and that’s probably compliments to Rob and going out and playing a style that suits me a lot more that it did at the Tigers.”

Certainly the England international has added some real guile and experience to the Chiefs cause this term - and it was evident as the Devonians dug deep early in the second period to repel the threat of Conor O'Shea's visitors who had closed the gap to 19-13 with Tikirotuma's score.

“We had them pinned in their half and we dropped off a couple of tackles, but the work we do to cover each other’s backs shows,” said Waldrom. “Listening to both Robs (coaches Baxter and Hunter) and Ali (Hepher), everyone is working hard for each other and that’s something you can’t teach, and that’s very pleasing.

“They scored a try then we had to get back in the game and I thought we did that very well. We controlled field position and got what we wanted at the end of the day.”

Waldrom also praised the part the Sandy Park faithful played during what was an absorbing contest.

“When you’re five metres out and you can hear the Tomahawk Chop it’s very catchy and you hum along at times, it’s that loud,” he said. “It’s a great place to play and the support we get here is amazing.”