Watching the Blues' players cavort around Kensington Park with Northland primary and secondary school students belied the seriousness of the bye week for their head coach Pat Lam.
"It's a chance for us to take stock and recover and get a few injuries out of the way and start the second
part of the season fresh," he said.
The coach said "Bluebeard Day" held yesterday gave the uninjured Blues a chance to relax and spend some time with their fans.
"It's been a good day, the boys have been taking the primary schools and the secondary schools through some expertise coaching so it's been good fun," he said.
The players get the rest of the week off but for Lam the second half of the season needs some thinking about.
"We're still in there because this year's table is a bit of a strange one and we've had a lot of bonus points but for us the most important thing is we have to improve our game."
He said the match against the Lions could take on epic proportions.
"We've got to favoured to win that but we need to win well and improve on the performances against the Warratahs and the Chiefs," he said.
Lam believes that the team has shown plenty of potential.
"We're still scoring tries, a lot of tries ... and the attitude of the boys is still good - we just need to build their confidence again by getting a win."
There is also a list of negatives that the coach will be addressing after the players reassemble in Auckland again next week. Defence will become the biggest focus in the build-up to playing the Lions at Eden Park.
"We've had to deal with a lot of frustration over the weekend that we didn't finish off with a win and that's because we're giving away soft points, if we tidy that up then that gives us a better chance," he said. "The Crusaders and the Highlanders against the Bulls, have been showing the way [with their defence] and we've done it against the Stormers, we need to step up as a group and do it again."
