Bath Score Six In Italy
Olly In Action
By Glen Leat
October 12 2002
Olly Barkley again played a blinder as a scoring machine for Bath as the former European Cup Winners trounced GRAN Parma 40 - 3 on a soaking wet pitch in Italy. Alongside the returning Matt Perry and Andy Long, Barkley only missed one conversion of the six tries scored by Bath.
This may only be the second string European competition but Bath took it seriously and flew home from Italy with a valuable away win under their belts and, perhaps more importantly, a good competitive run out which saw those elusive tries being scored which will help in the preparation for a difficult encounter against Leeds in a couple of weeks.
Andy Beattie started the scoring with a try in the 23rd minute and Andy Lloyd added another before the break. At 14-3 up Bath were well in control and the second half avalanche of four further tries will have given the team extra confidence in their playing skills to improve throughout the season. GRAN Parma are obviously not on a par with the opposition Bath will meet in their domestic competitions but winning is a habit and every win, whoever it is against, is a vital ingredient towards end of season success.
Matt Perry was quoted before the game as
being apprehensive about his first contact
following a lengthy lay-off with injury but
he can only have dreamed that his first contact
would actually be with the ball and scoring
a try in the 63rd minute.
Parma will be travelling to Bath next week
for the return leg and they must be worried
about the score Bath could post against them.
However Bath must treat this next game as
importantly as the first and look at it as
preparation for the following week against
the Tykes. That means playing as strong a
line-up as possible so the players can practice their
moves and get used to playing together.
Seeing how Bristol struggled in their opening
match, missing out on the tougher Heineken
Cup this year may have done us a favour as
undoubtedly we would have struggled against
the better teams and all this would have
done is to lessen our confidence.
Well done Bath this result is exactly what
we all needed.
Did you travel to the match? Have you any
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and I will post them on the site.
Let's look at the result of your prediction
for this game:
|
84%
| Scores GRAN Parma Pen 37 mins (Nel) Bath Try 23 mins (Beattie) Conv (Barkley) Try 28 mins (Lloyd) Conv (Barkley) Try 48 mins (Scaysbrook) Try 55 mins (Nathan Thomas) Conv (Barkley) Try 63 mins (Perry) Conv (Barkley) Try 69 mins (Barkley) Conv Barkley |
Bath:
15. Barkley, 14, Thirlby, 13, Maggs, 12,
Crockett, 11, Voyce, 10, Catt, 9, Cooper,
1, Emms, 2, Long, 3, Mallett, 4, Beattie,
5, Grewcock , 6, Scaysbrook, 7, Lyle, 8,
Lloyd