Bath sets sights on European success
Bath failed to capitalise on a twoman advantage at the death as they were condemned to a 13-19 defeat by Harlequins in the Gallagher Premiership at the Rec on Friday night.
Attentions now turn to Europe with a clash against Glasgow on Saturday, and Johann Van Graan was keen to emphasise that Europe will not be a secondary focus for his side this season.
“One of the things that I looked at over the last few years is that I don’t think Bath have performed well enough in Europe.
“It is certainly something we want to get better at. The same with the Premiership.
So, we’ll prioritise both competitions.”
Last year Bath failed to win a game in a pool that had both Leinster and La Rochelle, the eventual Champions Cup finalists, and were then punished by Edinburgh in the last 16 of the Challenge Cup as Bath suffered a 41-19 loss to end their campaign.
In 2020/21 Bath fared better, reaching the semi-finals of the Challenge Cup but in 2019/20 they failed to win a single game in the pool stage of the Champions Cup and in 2018/2019 the results were not much better, registering one win from their six games.
The overall record in Europe has been dismal in recent seasons but Van Graan expressed his own admiration for the competition and the appetite he has for Bath to succeed both home and abroad. “We’ll rotate our squad in the coming weeks, it’s a big Christmas period and then that month of January.
“We’re certainly not going to sit back. Personally, it’s a competition that I love.
“Having coached in it with a previous club, it’s a competition I see a lot of value in and we’re going to give it our best shot.”
Despite suffering another narrow defeat to Harlequins, the Bath coach remained upbeat and was confident about his side’s ability to progress across the board.
“We obviously want to perform well in the Premiership as well. But the big point about this season is that we want to get better in everything we do, and I certainly believe that we are.
“I think we saw that again tonight, so in Europe hopefully we can improve on previous seasons.”
The end of the year marks the beginning of a busy period for Bath and Van Graan welcomed the opportunities that his side now have going into the festive period, particularly in Europe.
“We’ve got five weeks now, four games coming up, with a bye week, so we’ve got clarity as to how we’re going to approach it. We need to be adaptable to weather and to what happens in the two games in Europe.
“If you look forward to that, Glasgow, a good friend of mine is coaching them now and they’ve certainly improved and then Toulon, one of the great European clubs. So for us to go over as a group to Toulon, it’s certainly something to look forward to.”