HEAD coach Gareth Williams knows Wales cannot afford to keep dropping off tackles when they face free-running New Zealand in the World Rugby U20 Championship on Monday.

The Welsh youngsters finished Pool A with a six-try, 44-28 win against Fiji in a chaotic clash in Santa Fe.

Their semi-final hopes were over before the fixture after their opening weekend 30-25 win against hosts Argentina was followed by a 32-13 loss to champions France.

Victory against the Fijian ensured they avoided dropping into the bottom rung of play-off fixtures and now they will battle for fifth place with New Zealand, Ireland and England.

On Monday they face the Baby Blacks on the plastic pitch in Rosario (kick-off 2.30pm) after the Kiwis saw their own last-four hopes dashed by South Africa in a bruising pool finale.

Williams has labelled the tournament a five-game series and has called on his prospects to up their performance if they are to return to Wales with a winning record.

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New Zealand are the tournament's leading try scorers with 17 in three pool games while the Welsh youngsters, after conceding bonus points to both the Pumitas and Les Bleuets, saw their line crossed four times by Fiji.

"(Defence coach) Andrew Bishop's frustration was very obvious at half-time, and rightly so," said Williams, who is used to facing the Fijians on the sevens circuit.

"Our structure was in place, our system was in place but we just had boys falling off tackles.

"At this level, and the level they want to progress to, that is not good enough and it kept Fiji in the game. That is something the boys need to learn and take forward."

"There are learnings from the game and for the next five days we will be picking at them, because we want the boys to go back having learnt those lessons," he continued.

"It's important that we don't ignore those little errors and individual discrepancies even though we won.

"It's about not being complacent and making sure we develop these individuals as we move through the competition."

While Wales' defence was disappointing, their tight game earned the spoils with the work under forwards coach Richard Kelly paying off.

"We fell into the trap of playing into Fiji's hands," said Williams. "I thought we took a grip of sections of the game, when we held them in their 22 and challenged them with our drive and scrum.

"But I was pleased to come out of it (with a win) and there is a lot of learning to take from it.

It was a difficult game to watch, the scoreline looks comfortable but it was far from that, so lots of credit to Fiji.

"When we allowed the game to become loose, they grew in confidence. When we able to tighten it up we showed our qualities."

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Dragons scrum-half Dafydd Buckland, who has started the last two games in place of the ill Harri Morgan, was among the try scorers against Fiji and was relieved to chalk up a win.

"We're delighted with the victory," said the 18-year-old. "It was a really tight game, but we came out on top in the end after fighting for the full 80.

"The first half was end to end. It's our third game in the tournament and some of the boys have had three full 80s so I'm really pleased.

"I'm buzzing about getting a try. The boys dominated the scrum for all of the game, so I took advantage of that, took a quick penalty and scored a five-metre try."

"I'm really enjoying playing, hopefully I'll get some more game time and we can finish as high as possible."

Monday fixtures

Semi-finals: Argentina v Australia (5pm), South Africa v France (7.30pm)

Fifth to eighth: New Zealand v Wales (2.30pm), Ireland v England (7.30pm)

Relegation: Scotland v Italy (2.30pm), Georgia v Fiji (5pm)

Final round of games next Saturday