Wales U20 interim head coach Mark Jones has brought a "belief" and "energy" to the set-up as his side aim to bounce back in the World U20s Championship against Japan on Thursday.
The former international wing stepped into the role last month after Bryon Hayward tendered his resignation as Lead Pathway coach, but Jones' arrival already seems to be having a positive effect on the squad.
In their World U20s Championship opener, Wales narrowly lost 27-26 to New Zealand and considering they had entered the competition on the back of a winless Six Nations campaign, there are plenty of positives for Jones' side to build on despite the heartbreaking defeat.
So what's changed?
"We have a big thing about committing to everything we do," fly-half Dan Edwards says. "It has really brought us tighter as a group. In the last 20 minutes in the Six Nations, we'd drop off a lot but on Saturday [v New Zealand], the last 20 minutes we were brilliant.
"You could see in the way we played on Saturday, we really had that belief that we could go out and score tries and roll them over. It wasn't meant to be but now we have got a massive challenge ahead of us on Thursday with Japan."
"Mark has come in and I don't know if you have met Mark, but he is very energetic and infectious around the group," adds set-piece coach Marc Breeze. "His attention to detail is absolutely excellent in fairness so as you can see, that is shining through at the moment in that first game and he has been great since he has been in."
Wales looked on course to potentially pull off the 'shock' of the opening round when they led 19-5 at half-time in Paarl but the Baby Blacks turned the game around in the second period to clinch a one-point victory.
"Going into the sheds at half-time, we knew they were going to come out firing second half," Edwards adds. "We didn't really have anything to cope with it but we really got back into it and showed great character and resilience to draw it back in the last 20 [came back from 27-19 down] and it could have gone any way from there. It was a very good experience, a learning curve which we are going to take into Thursday."
"We spoke before the game that we wanted to be committed to the cause right up until the 80th minute and we started off so well," says Breeze. "As coaches, we were more gutted for the boys. It was a weird one. It was there for the taking.
"They put so much effort in and there were opportunities in that game where we did things really well and some things, in fairness, New Zealand put us under pressure. Really disappointing but proud of the boys considering they didn't have any games coming into that game and New Zealand had three."
Despite the loss to New Zealand, Wales still picked up two points which could prove crucial for Jones' squad further down the line, but their immediate focus is on Japan on Thursday.
One of the areas Wales will be keen to improve on is their discipline. Against the Baby Blacks, they were pinged on 16 occasions so if they are to achieve their desired outcome in Stellenbosch, the players - and coaching staff - know they have to tidy up that area of their game.
"That is something we looked at as well so it was disappointing for us to give away that many penalties," scrum-half Archie Hughes says. "I think when you're playing in a Test match like that, to have a good chance of winning, you have got to keep it under 10 if you can but I think looking at that, it showed how much potential we have got.
"Even giving away 16 penalties, we were still within two points of winning the game so it is definitely something we are looking at now to try and keep that as low as we can."
"Anything over eight [penalties] is going to put pressure on you so we have got a little bit of tidying up around that which we looked at this week," says Breeze.
"Usually, whenever there is a penalty unless it is strictly set-piece, the penalty starts two phases before because we may have not got our roles right and stuff so just getting that understanding is vital that everyone is doing their own roles correctly so we don't put ourselves under pressure."
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In their opening game of the tournament, Japan were on the wrong end of a 75-12 hammering by top seeds France so Wales will be hoping Thursday afternoon's fixture can garner their first victory of the competition.
But to do that, Breeze knows the squad need to build on their learnings from their performance against New Zealand: "We are just focusing on what we do and what we can pull from the New Zealand game.
"We have got structures in place that allows us if we need to go certain ways or go to a certain aspect of our game, the players understand that and that was a big thing learning from New Zealand around the momentum and what that looks like.
"How do we create momentum for ourselves? What are Japan's threats? Do you want to be feeding the speed all the time? Do we want to make it loose? So it is making the players understand, at certain times in a game or certain areas of the pitch, what is best to put the pressure back on them.
"It [v New Zealand] was the first hit out with the boys since Mark has come in. It was good to see the stuff we introduced to see where that is. It has been a real good learning opportunity since the game and hopefully that will drive us to go into Japan."
