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Former Bath player wants to extend club's misery by at least one more game
By Chris Jones
In normal circumstances any team with a 16 point lead over Bath would expect to be enjoying a top-four place in the Premiership, however, this is anything but a normal season as Christian Judge, their former tighthead prop acknowledges.
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Judge will arrive at the Recreation Ground with his Worcester teammates keenly aware that Bath are bottom of the Premiership after 10 successive defeats. Judge left Bath after two years with the club to join Worcester in the summer and the prop, who was a Premiership title winner with Saracens, is also conscious that 12th placed Worcester have to end their own dreadful record at the Rec to contend with.
Remarkably, Worcester have never won on Bath’s famously heavy pitch – a surface that is in stark contrast to the Sixways artificial grass that has helped develop their running game. He is joined by two other former Bath players in the Worcester match squad Matt Garvey and Will Chudley to increase the inside knowledge of the opposition but with 16 defeats and one draw in their last 17 away games in the Premiership, Judge knows Worcester have massive odds to overcome. Warriors have won only once away from home in any competition since their trip to Russia to face Enisei in November 2019.
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Judge, who is celebrating his 29th Birthday today (sat) said: “They are looking for a first win of the season but we are going there to win and both sides will be fired up for it. Our away record is poor and you cannot be climbing up the table if you don’t win on the road.
“It isn’t what you expect to see – Bath with the points they have – but a season can change with one result. You look at the current top four with Gloucester and Harlequins and not long ago they were going through transition periods and are now doing well.
“Any time you play against a former club it is a huge game and I still have a lot of friends at Bath. There are a lot of familiar faces and it will be a big occasion in front of a passionate crowd at the Rec. Bath are going through a tough period and if you look back at previous years there have been teams who have gone through similar problems like Leicester and even ourselves last season when we didn’t have a great record.
“You can’t predict from one season to the other and as a group Bath are searching for that first victory and will be well up for this game. They have a lot of quality players and just because they are having a tough season doesn’t mean you can’t respect them. What has gone in the past doesn’t count for much and they can be dangerous with all their talent. It is no secret that we like to move the ball around and the Rec does get boggy at this time of the year and it is something you can’t ignore but just have to carry on.”
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