The Scarlets were beaten 28-17 at Ravenhill as an impressive season came to a disappointing end at the semi-final stages.
Tries from Tommy Bowe, Robbie Diack and Tom Court had given the top seeds a commanding 25-3 advantage just three minutes into the second half but Easterby’s troops hit back with two tries of their own through Gareth Davies and Sione Timani to bring a greater respectability to the scoreline.
And the manner in which the Scarlets finished the 80 minutes in Belfast, coupled with the form they showed over 22 rounds of league action, ensured Easterby could take some positives home to Llanelli.
“I’m so proud of the players in the way they came back when they were out on their feet. We showed a huge amount of character,” said Easterby.
“We set ourselves a target to come here and get a result – we didn’t get that and we’re disappointed with a lot of things that were in our control that we didn’t get right – but we showed real character to get back into the game.
“There was a fair bit of emotion in the changing room. It’s been a good year in many ways – we’ve learnt a lot about ourselves.
“We haven’t played our best rugby in the last two weeks but we can take a lot from the last quarter of the match against a very good team and from what got us into this play-off.
“This will make us much more hungry to go on next year and repeat our semi-final appearance but learn from our mistakes.”
Easterby admitted that it was mistakes that cost his team dear in the first period in particular.
“Our error count and indiscipline in the first half allowed them to gain the advantage,” added Easterby, who lost Rhys Priestland to injury before kick off and then saw the likes of Scott Williams, Ken Owens, Liam Williams and George Earle forced off prematurely.
“They won the gainline in the first half and our turnover rate was too high. I think at half time we’d given away nine penalties and they’d given away three, and we’d given away 15 turnovers and they’d given away three. We were own worst enemy at times.
“It was a bit of a disruption to lose Rhys but Owen Williams has gone very well for us. He’s been a standout player for us over the last couple of months and his kicking in particular is what got us to this position.
“It was disappointing for Rhys but I wouldn’t say it had a major bearing on the result.”
