For 38 minutes of the match he saw their very best, but then he saw some of their worst for the remaining 42 minutes.

But he remains confident they are still on track as the club rebuild continues.

The Thunder led 17-5 in the shadows of the break before the Redman crossed just on half-time which was an insight into what was about to unfold in the second half.

“If I knew what happened in the second half I’d be coaching at a lot higher level of rugby,” he said.

“The wheels fell off.”

Minor felt the first half performance was another step in the right direction after they competed well against Port Pirates last week and trailed 13-10.

The coach remained confident his team were building into the season and it was a much more competitive side than over the last two years.

He just knows it isn’t possible to defend for extended periods of time and not concede points.

“We simply need to get our hands on the ball,” he said.

“We cruel ourselves by not keeping the ball and then that makes ourselves defend a lot of the time.”

Minor admitted his team were better than Grafton for 40 minutes, but they couldn’t sustain it for the entire game.

“We know we can be more than competitive and when we play to our structures we play some dangerous football,” he said.

“They had the ball for probably 30 of the 40 minutes in the second half and you just can’t defend for that long.

“Across the paddock we were pretty good, we just fell away in the second half.”