Their World Cup journey may have come to an end in Marseille in a quarter final defeat to Argentina, but Gatland believes the team can continue to grow after recording four pool wins in France.
It won’t be long before the players are back together again for the Wales XV fixture against the Barbarians at Principality Stadium on Saturday, 4 November, and only 112 days before kick-off in the 2024 Guinness Six Nations Championship with a home clash against Scotland.
There are then two away trips to Twickenham to face England, and Dublin to take on Ireland, before the tournament ends with home games against France and Italy
“We’re all pretty disappointed, pretty gutted about losing to Argentina – it’s one that slipped away from us,” said Gatland.
“But you’ve got to take learnings rom defeat. How do you continue to improve and to develop as a squad?
“We faced a team that kicked a lot against us, and kicked long, and we probably played a little bit too much rugby at times around halfway. Maybe we needed to be a little bit more conservative, but we have to find out how to take those learnings and grow as a team.
“I’m incredibly proud of the work that these players have put in. The coaches, the whole staff, have been absolutely fantastic and we’ve made some really good strides.
“Now we need to make sure we continue on that path – we don’t want to be going backwards. That’s a good challenge for us to accept, to make sure we continue to keep improving.
“They should be proud of what they have done, and we’ve got to make sure we continue to grow and improve as a team. We’ve got some exciting players coming through who will hopefully be inspired by this and will want to be involved going forward.
“A lot of people were writing us off before this tournament, saying we wouldn’t get out of the group, so that was the first thing. This group have worked really hard to get what they have achieved.
“I told the players in the changing room, you may be very down, very disappointed, but you should hold your heads up.”
