Burnell Hails 'Fantastic' Welsh

London Welsh head coach Justin Burnell was in understandably jubilant mood after watching his side clinch their place in next season's Aviva Premiership.

The Exiles took a 27-8 lead to the Memorial Stadium from their 1st leg meeting at the Kassam Stadium, and although tries from Andy Short, Mitch Eadie and Adam Hughes brought Bristol to within eight points, James Tideswell and Seb Stegmann crossed late on to ensure an immediate Premiership return for Welsh.

Gordon Ross's conversion of Stegmann's try gave Welsh a 21-20 victory on the night and a 48-28 aggregate win overall.

"It's just fantastic for London Welsh; it's a fantastic club,” said Burnell. "Next year it will be Leicester, Northampton and Saracens – absolutely over the moon.

"How good is that going to be in Oxford and for the supporters – Premiership rugby.”

Not for the first time this season, Burnell singled out the character within this London Welsh squad as the key ingredient in this season's success.

"I've been very fortunate; I worked in a very successful period with the Cardiff Blues but what you find with London Welsh is we haven't really got any marquee signings or superstars. What we've got is a massive collective approach,” added Burnell.

"If you work hard you get rewards. That's our environment and that's what we thrive on.

"People who now come into our environment now have to fit into what we're about. It's about the London Welsh environment and approach.”

Despite taking a 19-point advantage into Wednesday's 2nd leg, Burnell sent his side out at the Memorial Stadium with the mind-set of winning the game, and not just sitting back on their lead.

"It was never about aggregate, we had to come here to win. For our progression we have to come to places like this and win,” he said.

"If you're going to go into the Premiership you've got to have consistency and over the two legs and we had two wins. Aggregate was irrelevant.

"We were constantly reminded that there would be 12,000 people screaming and shouting, but we had to shut that noise out and worry about ourselves.

"We weathered the storm for the first 20-30 minutes and then dug in and went up another gear.”

When Hughes crossed for Bristol with 11 minutes to go, just eight points separated the sides, however, and a Memorial Stadium eager to end the club's 93-year association at the ground in style sensed an opportunity. Burnell, though, had confidence in his players.

"You've got to have belief. I'm very fortunate that I haven't just got 22 players, I've 40 players and 12 support staff who've all got the same vision as me,” he said.

"When they threw absolutely everything at us we soaked it up and just kept coming and coming, and then our bench came on and changed the game as it does every week.

"Bristol have been a very, very good side all year - they've been the form team. We've just been sitting in the back ground coming up nice and quietly and I was very confident that in the final furlong we'd come up on the fence and take the plaudits.”

Burnell also singled out London Welsh fly half and assistant coach Ross for praise, after an exemplary kicking display, both in front of goal and tactically, in testing conditions.

"He's just professional; he trains harder than any of our players. He really struggled in the Leeds game at home – he missed so many kicks – but there was nobody blaming Gordon. I always knew he would come good,” said Burnell.