Launchbury an inspiration as Wasps win again
This was a tale of two locks with Joe Launchbury inspiring Wasps to their sixth straight Premiership win while Charlie Ewels suffered an injury that is likely to rule him out of England’s two-day training camp in Brighton next week. Ewels was in the squad named by England head coach Eddie Jones yesterday but the six-times capped player hobbled off after just 24 minutes.
“It looks as if he’s got a hamstring injury so it could be anything from two to three weeks,” said Todd Blackadder, Bath director of rugby.
In contrast, Launchbury produced another rampaging performance in attack before he turned his attentions to defence to prevent Bath overturning the 19-point lead that Wasps had built in a devastating first 20 minutes.
“Nothing changes with Joe, he’s either good or very good,” said Dai Young, Wasps’ director of rugby. “He doesn’t go much below that.”
“The biggest thing is that when things weren’t going well for us he was a bit of a beacon. When we weren’t playing well, he was playing well. He carried really strongly and defensively I thought he was strong. He’s in his second season as captain with us. People can see what he does on the field on game days but around the club during the week, driving standards, he has been outstanding.”
Thanks to Launchbury’s efforts and two first-half tries from wing Marcus Watson, who got the better of his family duel with younger brother Anthony, the Bath fullback, Wasps held on, although they lost some of their composure in the latter stages of each half.
Bath capitalised when Watson was sin-binned for a deliberate knock-on and scored 14 points while Wasps were down to 14 men. They also salvaged two bonus points from a game in which they were second best, with Zach Mercer crossing for an important try 15 minutes from time.
“It was a game we should have won a bit more comfortably,” said Young. “The first 25 minutes were excellent then we had a number of opportunities where our last pass didn’t quite stick and we became a little bit loose and a little bit undisciplined and allowed them to get a bit of a platform inside our half.
“Then our defence wasn’t good enough on the first two tackles and they got behind us. I thought we made it hard for ourselves but you have to give Bath credit. When they had opportunities they nailed them as well. Two yellow cards didn’t help, they scored a lot of points during those periods and we need to be better than that.”
Young has some defensive frailties to work on, but Blackadder has more concerns. Last week he questioned the mindset of his players after they were beaten at Sale, here he was concerned about the turnovers that gifted Wasps easy points.
“I have to take my hat off to Wasps, they were absolutely ruthless when we made too many unforced errors especially in the first 20 minutes,” he said. “They absolutely punched us and taught us a lesson in ball retention.”
Bath’s fightback included firsthalf tries from Rhys Priestland and Jack Wilson, but they leaked another try at the start of the second half when they again coughed up possession and allowed Gaby Lovobalavu, promoted from the bench after Kyle Eastmond suffered a calf injury in the warm-up, to score Wasps’ bonus point try.
Meanwhile, Wasps have yet to offer out-of-contract James Haskell a new deal but Young hinted that may change now that the back row forward is back in England’s squad.