Assistant coach Gordon Ross said that London Welsh won’t give up on their chances of avoiding relegation from the Aviva Premiership, writes Matthew Bruce.

Basement side Welsh are 15 points adrift of joint nearest rivals Newcastle Falcons ahead of their trip to the north-east tomorrow, but Ross insisted they have not pinned their hopes of survival on this match.

“We’ve not spoken about it, our focus is just on improvement and on the next game,” he said.

“We want to improve every week and we aim to win every match, though obviously that might not be possible.

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“But, barring Saracens, I think we’ve been competitive in every game we’ve played recently.

“The effort and endeavour has been there for the full 80 minutes, but perhaps the accuracy or quality hasn’t.”

Newcastle’s Kingston Park is one of two stadiums in the league with an artificial pitch.

The other is Saracens’ Allianz Park, the scene of the Exiles’ 78-7 hammering less than a month ago.

However, Ross does not feel that the surface will give the home side an advantage.

“The pitch allows you to play some nice high-tempo rugby and, to give Newcastle credit, that’s what they have done lately.

Welsh have done some training on an artificial pitch this week.

Ross said: “We also trained on it quite a bit over the Christmas period due to the frozen conditions.

“We’re used to it now and I don’t think it will have a big impact on the game.

“It’s quite exposed and windy there, so if anything I would expect that to have a bigger bearing.”

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