Head coach Richard Hill insists Bristol’s defensive frailties will not be on show when the club visits Harlequins on Saturday.

Bristol lost 33-20 against Bath on Sunday in the Guinness Premiership opener, gifting three tries to Steve Meehan’s men.

Centre Kevin Maggs and scrum-half Haydn Thomas missed Joe Maddock for Bath’s first try.

Then Maggs was confused by a dummy runner before Tom Cheeseman touched down and a tired Andrew Blowers failed to tap-tackle Jonny Faamatuainu on his way to the line.

Hill admitted: “We made some sloppy defensive errors last week.

“Bath took their chances well but we have to be critical about ourselves. We would not normally concede three soft tries like that.

“I would like to think we can rectify that and not allow Harlequins to go through that easy this weekend. We can do better.”

Hill has revealed former Harlequins second row Roy Winters and ex-Bristol skipper Matt Salter will not recover in time for the trip to the Stoop.

But centre Neil Brew could feature against Quins should he finally shake off the hamstring problem he has carried since July.

Winters pulled his calf muscle in the pre-season victory over Newport while Salter has not featured at all so far after damaging his bicep muscle in July.

Salter was due to return to full contact training yesterday while Winters could come into contention for the next home game against Sale on Friday week.

Hill, though, is looking forward to seeing blindside flanker Salter back in action and playing for the first time in the coach’s tenure without the captaincy.

Hill added: “We have missed him. Salts was looking in good shape prior to the injury.

“He was looking forward to not having the responsibility of captaincy.

“He was training hard and looking forward to playing and was devastated  when he had the injury.”

Speaking about Winters and Brew, he added: “Roy is going to be a little bit longer. He has not trained with us yet but he’s not too far off.

“He will certainly rest up for this week and could be in contention for Sale.

“Neil did not train on Tuesday. If he comes through Wednesday’s session then he could be available.”

Scrum-half Shaun Perry (shoulder), prop Darren Crompton (ankle) and flanker Iain Grieve (hamstring) are  still sidelined.