Impressive strength in depth heped us overcome Falcons
IT was a happy New Year’s Day for Bears supporters and what an exciting encounter it turned out to be against Newcastle Falcons. It took all of 43 seconds for Bristol to score the first Premiership try of 2021 when a brilliant interception from Callum Sheedy allowed Siva Naulago to run in for his first Bristol try. Shame his name was spelt wrong on his shirt!
From then on it was the forwards versus backs game that we all envisaged at the start of the week. Due to Covid-19, Pat Lam had to completely change our front row and full credit to our strength in depth we were still able to compete against a fearsome and well-drilled Newcastle pack.
Before the game the talk was about how quick Newcastle’s young wingers were and it was a shame not to see them in action as they saw little of the ball, but I am sure both have big futures.
After a fairly even first half, Bristol again were first out the traps in the second and brilliant tries from Hughes and the man of the match George Kloska sealed a hard-earned bonus-point victory to take us into second in the table.
Something that has caught my attention in recent months has been the questionable punditry from BT Sport commentator and former Wasps and England No 8 Lawrence Dallaglio.
Bristol supporters are used to having a pantomime relationship with Austin Healey, but lately Dallaglio has nailed the role of Widow Twanky, making what I believe to be embarrassing comments and in my opinion awful punditry.
This was a guy I used to respect as a player, but he seems to be losing touch with the modern game and becoming more of a dinosaur every week.
He has continued to slate Nathan Hughes even though the big fella is having a fantastic season, and last week he insinuated Steven Luatua was coming into the twilight of his career at the grand old age of 29!
BT Sport has a fantastic set of rugby commentators; full of knowledge of the modern game and the coverage is second to none. Personally I feel ‘Big Lol’ needs to step up a gear and start becoming as good a pundit as he was a player.