Silva’s side will face the toughest challenge in the Principality Premiership with Merthyr comfortably beating RGC1404 last weekend. But whereas Silva is quick to acknowledge the size of the task ahead he is adamant his players will not die wondering.
“We need to keep the ball in hand against Merthyr and really take them on because you are unlikely to win an arm wrestle against them,” he said.
“It’s going to be a very difficult evening but we won’t die wondering. We have to win the collision area because that’s where RGC came unstuck against them last week.
“They came out in the second half and stuck it up the jumper. First and foremost you have to match that but you can’t just have one up runners either.
“They are very organised in defence and are hard to break down. We’ve got to get the phases going and create chances.”
With the threat of relegation having returned to the Premiership the intensity of games has risen. But despite a tough start to the season Silva has banned the word relegation and is confident his squad of home-grown players can keep the Ravens in the league.
“Most of our squad are young and are local boys,” he said.
“We aren’t big spender’s so these boys are here because they want to play for Bridgend Ravens.
“They’ve grown up in the town fully aware of the tradition and history of the club and that is a massive motivational factor. A lot of my players’ fathers played for the club before them.
“I’ve taken the word relegation out of our environment. We are targeting to pick up points from every game and come January we want to put around the 35 point mark.
“What we don’t want to be doing is being low on points in February and March. Most of the games have all been one score games which means that sides have upped the intensity.
“The error rate in the league is down and games aren’t being decided by one or two mistakes as would have been the case in the past.”
Merthyr: M Jarvis; L Williams, A Thomas, J Martin, K Evans; R Powell, J James; J Howe, R Williams, L Jones, P Mcbride, C Locke, N White, O Davies, H Barnes.
Replacements: M Dwyer, S Hobbs, B Warren, P Rees, J Thomas, A Hoskins, J Baker, T Gee.
Bridgend: T Williams; A Grabham, S Ellis, N Edwards, M Kennedy; J Murphy, C Tantum; R Apsee, I Merriman, C Lewis, J Little, S O’Rourke, J Pope, D Davies, T Morgan.
Replacements: G Harvey, O Evans, G Daniel, M Donnelly, A Evans, C Williams, R Evans, D Moss.
Kick-off: 7:10pm (Live on BBC Scrum V)
