Outmuscled in an error-strewn loss

Team Bath were outmuscled and out-fought in an exhausting 33-10 home loss to Leeds Beckett in BUCS Super Rugby at the Sports Training Village last Wednesday.

“The boys know what went wrong tonight and they’re disappointed,” said coach Aaron James who pointed up the home team’s costly error count.

It was a tough night for the students, sponsored by Rengen, as the Northern visitors maintained their unbeaten stretch against Bath, overcoming the bitter and windy conditions to secure the win.

Wednesday’s result means the last victory Team Bath recorded over Beckett came in October 2018, a thriller at Bath’s Recreation Ground which saw Team Bath win 29-27 in the Rengen Anniversary Game. Since then Beckett have had the upper hand with two wins in the 2019-20 season, one in the second half of the 2018-19 season and another on the opening day of this campaign.

James, Head of Rugby at the University of Bath, reflected: “We were very disappointed with the mistakes and the penalty count. You can’t win a game if you make that many mistakes. The boys know what went wrong tonight and they’re disappointed.

“Leeds are a pretty physical side and do quite well technically. We didn’t fire and they didn’t let us. We made mistakes that were in our control.”

With the wind causing a constant menace, both teams came out of the gates swinging and it was Leeds who scored first following a rumbling maul from a lineout inside the Bath 22. The conversion was missed.

Team Bath struck back less than five minutes later, number 8 Harry Breeze finishing off a combined forwards maul effort to level the score. However, discipline continued to cost Bath dearly as the half played out and repeated offences gifted the visitors the chance to restore their lead through an Olly Toomey penalty.

Beckett’s set-piece pressure at both scrum and lineout garnered them a large portion of the territory, possession and lineout turnover and Team Bath eventually cracked as the visitors stole a lineout close to their line and stormed over with a pick and drive.

A successful conversion pushed the gap to 15-5 and was followed by a cracking 40m drop goal from Toomey. Just before the break, Bath flanker Tom Williams was sinbinned and Leeds took the opportunity to stretch their half-time lead to 25-5.

With Bath still down to 14 men, a well-drilled backs move set up Leeds winger Api Bavadra to finish out wide for the game’s first running try shortly after the restart and the hosts found themselves 25 points adrift.

The remainder of a low-scoring second half descended into a tough physical battle as both teams wrestled for control. The wind dropped slightly, denying Team Bath the reverse aerial advantage to that gained by the visitors in the first half.

As the game moved into the later stages, the hosts managed to sustain attacking pressure and Leeds lock Jordan Brown was sin-binned after disrupting a clear try-scoring opportunity from a lineout.

The visitors’ line was finally breached with a minute to go as replacement Archie Maggs trundled over off the back of a lineout but Leeds had the last word as Toomey slotted over a penalty kick to complete the scoring.

■ AVONVALE travelled to Swindon College Old Boys for another first ever fixture. On a cold day, Vale played with a bitterly cold, strong wind behind them and opened the scoring after some great driving work by their much lighter forwards who created space for right wing Will Andrews to dot down in the right hand corner after five minutes. The difficult conversion was missed from wide out.

Swindon then took control, using their big forwards against the wind and scored two tries. Vale were hanging on and, from a speculative kick from fly-half Sam Fellows, the ball bounced kindly for Andrews who darted between two surprised defenders to score. Vale had a great chance at the end of the first half to score but a line-out five metres out was botched and the scores were level at half-time.

With the wind behind them in the second half, and their large forwards, Swindon were expected to romp away with the game. However Vale had different ideas. Although being down to 14 men for the remainder of the game, Andrews intercepted a pass to score under the posts with Fellows converting to give them a 17-10 lead.

Then, with the Swindon forwards tiring and a spilled ball gathered up by Andrews in his own 22, he sprinted outside four defenders to give Vale a 22-10 lead with five minutes left.

The successful conversion meant Swindon had to score two tries just to level it.

Swindon however would not lie down and, after a mistake from the kick-off, Vale gave away a penalty. Swindon kicked for the corner and following the line-out they moved the ball wide and scored. The try was superbly converted from the touchline. Swindon attacked again straight from the kick-off and, with Vale tiring, they scored again but fortunately for Vale the conversion was missed as they held to win 24-22.

■ AVON clocked up their third bonus point win in a row with a comfortable 28–5 victory against Wells to move up to fifth in the Somerset Prem.

Yet for much of the first half, Avon were forced to defend as they struggled against the fierce wind. Wells enjoyed a surfeit of possession but were unable to convert it into points in the face of some unrelenting Avon defence, epitomised by demon tackling from Dan Cousineau and Zak Harwood. Avon were also their own worst enemies as they conceded a string of penalties to allow their visitors to maintain their momentum.

But when Avon moved up field, they proved to be ruthless as scrum-half Kiddie Sheikh sniped down the blind-side to touch down his sixth try of the season. This was a sign of things to come as Avon started to develop their game with a mixture of deft off-loads and some inspired bursts from Ian Burnell, Ben May and Cousineau, who deservedly picked up the man of the match award for his all-round performance in attack and defence.

With the Avon pack starting to get on top with a solid scrum and steady line-out, the black and ambers launched a sweeping attack to stretch the defence on the left before switching play where Iain Parris strolled over for his tenth try of the season.

Avon’s 10-0 lead at half time against the elements seemed ominous for the visitors and so it proved shortly after the restart as a powerful scrum led to possession with a strike against the head in the 22, leaving fly-half Tom Boreham to take route one to touch down at the posts. This scrum pressure was all the more remarkable as prop Louis Belsten discovered afterwards that he played the whole second half with a fractured shoulder.

Jonny Batchelor added the extras, then followed up with two successful penalties as Wells started to wilt. Increasing pressure saw centre Guy Palmer cut a great line only to be denied by a last ditch tackle from Wells’ impressive fullback Corey Baker.

Shortly afterwards, Wells mounted a promising attack inside Avon’s 22 but, from a quick turnover, Batchelor then produced an astonishing clearance that travelled fully 80 metres down-field to set up another attacking position. From the well-rehearsed line-out catch and drive, Sam Book emerged from under the pile of bodies for Avon’s bonus point try.

With the clock in the red, Wells’ efforts were eventually rewarded as Miles Letchford drove over for a consolation try.