Bath Need A Win - Desperately!

C'mon U Bath
By Glen Leat
September 16 2004

Bath make their first League trip to Worcester knowing anything less than a convincing win against the pre-season relegation favourites will be unacceptable to coach and supporters. After the disappointment at the Rec last Saturday there are a lot of Bath players owing their team a performance.

Whilst Worcester have also lost their opening two games of the season they have at least gained a bonus point and are probably playing as well as expected. Bath on the other hand are pointless(sic) and performing like a scratch team with no appetite for competitive rugby. If any of the players want to understand what "passion for your club" means, they only had to read the messageboard on this site following the debacle against Newcastle.

As you would expect (and be thankful for) there are no panic measures coming out of the club. "We won't be making massive changes," said John Connolly. "We have trained pretty well this week, and while we were poor at the weekend, we know we can, and will, play much better. We missed some one-on-one tackles, which is disappointing, but the players were in the right position to make those tackles. We were not stretched defensively in that respect." Blimey John I wouldn't want to see us when we are stretched defensively!

Bath Rugby currently has a very talented squad and with a little bit of cohesion between forwards and backs, sharper tackling and a game plan which makes the most of our strengths we should soon get back on track. I think Bath are at their most dangerous when they up the tempo and keep the opposition on the back foot, this was sadly lacking last week. Additionally it is essential that we don't lose concentration when playing this style of rugby as we will pay heavily as we found out at Northampton.

It looks as though Olly Barkley will finally get a start this season but coach Connelly suggests this may only be because of an injury to Chris Malone, "Olly is back in contention for this weekend. Chris is struggling with slight groin and hamstring problems, and we will have to wait and see how he progresses this week."

Robbie Fleck surely must make a comeback for the very average Spencer Davey as you can't have a world class player sat on the bench when your team is struggling. That's assuming Fleckie hasn't been deported to face his enemies in court in South Africa!

Duncan Bell looked about as fit as Coochie Coo after a heavy night of verbal fisticuffs on the Bristol Messageboard last week and on the strength of that I don't think he should be starting, however I expect he will.

Finally I don't want to get back on my Martyn Wood soapbox but I still believe his style of play is not helping the linkage between forwards and backs or speeding up our game and I'd like to see our new signing Nick Walshe give a starting position - though I doubt this will happen.

I always predict a Bath win, as my heart always rules my head when it comes to Bath, however I have genuine concerns about our ability to grab a vital win to get us off the bottom of the table - we're too close to Bris lounging down there!

 Possible Bath Line Up

Maddock, Crockett, Fleck, Tindall, Daniel, Barkley, Wood, Barnes, Humphreys, Bell, Borthwick, Grewcock, Beattie, Lipman, Fea'unati.

Worcester:

Delport; O'Leary, Hayes, Trueman, Lombard; Brown, Cole; Windo, Daly, Fortey, Collier, Gillies, Greeff, Sanderson, MacLeod-Henderson. Replacements: Sparks, Van Niekerk, Murphy, Hickey, Stuart-Smith, Hinshelwood, Roke.

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Click on to the Worcester Warriors site for their perspective on things.