HEAD coach Carl Hogg wants his “senior” Worcester Warriors players to be more like All Blacks legend Richie McCaw.

Warriors were punished at the breakdown by referee Greg MacDonald in last Friday’s 18-17 Aviva Premiership defeat to Northampton Saints.

Rookie Matthew O’Grady takes charge of his maiden Premiership match tomorrow when Warriors visit Exeter Chiefs (4.30pm).

Hogg wants his troops to learn from former New Zealand flanker McCaw, who often played on the edge of the laws as he racked up a record 148 Test appearances.

“If you look at the world’s top players, I cast my mind back to Richie who had the ability to manipulate the margins in his favour,” he said. “That’s part of being a smart player and what we have to learn from last Friday.

“We have talked about needing to look at the referee and the way he interprets the breakdown and for some of our senior players to have a look at footage to see how he reacts around breakdown and for us to act accordingly.

“If we have an understanding of the referee and what he’s looking for, we can adapt our behaviour.”

Hogg refused to publicly blast the display of MacDonald, who came under fire from the Sixways crowd for his performance. But Hogg revealed he had spoken to Tony Spreadbury, who heads up the RFU refereeing department, this week.

“There has been a conversation between me and Tony but that’s something I would like to keep between us,” said Hogg.

“With internationals on at the moment, some of the senior referees have been promoted to international level and we have to be able to adapt and learn, especially the senior players.”

Warriors conceded 18 penalties against Saints and cannot afford to be so ill-disciplined against Exeter, who reached the 2015-16 Premiership final.

“We addressed our discipline post-Sale and had got a penalty count below 10, which is always your magic number,” said Hogg.

“We travelled pretty well over the last month to six weeks prior to Saints. We had a different interpretation around some of the breakdown last week, which was frustrating, but we need to adapt to it.”