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The table-turning halftime message Johann Van Graan gave Bath

By PA
Johann van Graan and Ross Moloney (PA)

Bath head coach Johann Van Graan praised his side’s comeback after seeing them overturn a 24-17 half-time deficit to claim a 12-try Gallagher Premiership thriller 55-31 against Gloucester before a capacity crowd at Kingsholm.

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After last week’s surprising home defeat to Bristol, Bath needed a quick response but they were second best in the first half as Wales scrum-half Tomos Williams inspired Gloucester to score some excellent tries to put the visitors on the back foot.

However, Bath were a totally different side in the second half by raising their game to dominate proceedings with the hosts crumbling in the face of rampant opposition.

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Bristol and England’s Dave Attwood joins the guys this week to reveal some loose stories from a well-traveled career. We hear about his run-in with Owen Farell, why his modern man approach didn’t go down well with a certain head coach, and skiing in France with the Galacticos of Toulon. We also get Dave’s first-hand account of Carl Fearns and Gavin Henson’s bust-up and the fallout from Sam Burgess’ move to Bath.

Beno Obano scored two tries for Bath, while Josh Bayliss, Tom De Glanville, Ollie Lawrence, Jaco Coetzee and Finn Russell were also on the try-scoring sheet, with Russell adding five conversions and a penalty. There was also a penalty try award.

Max Llewellyn, Williams, Charlie Atkinson and Ollie Thorley scored Gloucester’s tries, while Santiago Carreras converted three and kicked a penalty as George Barton added a conversion.

Van Graan said: “There were a few words at half-time as we needed more width, reaction speed and to improve our contact.

Fixture
Gallagher Premiership
Gloucester
31 - 55
Full-time
Bath
All Stats and Data

“We needed to be a lot better in the second half and we were.

“There was a very good mindset and we made one or two tactical adjustments. I was very happy with the way the guys responded.

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“We also used the wind and to get a bonus point and score eight tries here is a very good effort.”

The home side overcame considerable disruption in the first half, losing three players to head injury assessments (HIA) with only flanker Jack Clement able to return as Gareth Anscombe and Freddie Thomas remained on the sidelines.

Gloucester head coach, George Skivington, said: “The final scoreline was tough to take as we were right in the game with 20 minutes to go.

“We were very good in the first half with some decent line-breaks and our attack looked good but we allowed the game to run away from us.

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“We pushed our luck to the limit at times. Our attack did score four tries but on the downside was, we gave them four tries from our errors.

“We lost a couple of locks and our line-out malfunctioned by losing six line-outs so we need to be better than that if we are going to win Premiership games.

“We took nothing from this fixture last season so a bonus-point is at least an improvement but that’s only a minor positive.”

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DP 38 days ago

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JW 3 hours ago
'Passionate reunion of France and New Zealand shows Fabien Galthie is wrong to rest his stars'

Ok, managed to read the full article..

... New Zealand’s has only 14 and the professional season is all over within four months. In France, club governance is the responsibility of an independent organisation [the Ligue Nationale de Rugby or LNR] which is entirely separate from the host union [the Fédération Française de Rugby or FFR]. Down south New Zealand Rugby runs the provincial and the national game.

That is the National Provincial Championship, a competition of 14 representative union based teams run through the SH international window and only semi professional (paid only during it's running). It is run by NZR and goes for two and a half months.


Super Rugby is a competition involving 12 fully professional teams, of which 5 are of New Zealand eligibility, and another joint administered team of Pacific Island eligibility, with NZR involvement. It was a 18 week competition this year, so involved (randomly chosen I believe) extra return fixtures (2 or 3 home and away derbys), and is run by Super Rugby Pacific's own independent Board (or organisation). The teams may or may not be independently run and owned (note, this does not necessarily mean what you think of as 'privately owned').


LNR was setup by FFR and the French Government to administer the professional game in France. In New Zealand, the Players Association and Super Rugby franchises agreed last month to not setup their own governance structure for professional rugby and re-aligned themselves with New Zealand Rugby. They had been proposing to do something like the English model, I'm not sure how closely that would have been aligned to the French system but it did not sound like it would have French union executive representation on it like the LNR does.

In the shaky isles the professional pyramid tapers to a point with the almighty All Blacks. In France the feeling for country is no more important than the sense of fierce local identity spawned at myriad clubs concentrated in the southwest. Progress is achieved by a nonchalant shrug and the wide sweep of nuanced negotiation, rather than driven from the top by a single intense focus.

Yes, it is pretty much a 'representative' selection system at every level, but these union's are having to fight for their existence against the regime that is NZR, and are currently going through their own battle, just as France has recently as I understand it. A single focus, ala the French game, might not be the best outcome for rugby as a whole.


For pure theatre, it is a wonderful article so far. I prefer 'Ntamack New Zealand 2022' though.

The young Crusader still struggles to solve the puzzle posed by the shorter, more compact tight-heads at this level but he had no problem at all with Colombe.

It was interesting to listen to Manny during an interview on Maul or Nothing, he citied that after a bit of banter with the All Black's he no longer wanted one of their jersey's after the game. One of those talks was an eye to eye chat with Tamaiti Williams, there appear to be nothing between the lock and prop, just a lot of give and take. I thought TW angled in and caused Taylor to pop a few times, and that NZ were lucky to be rewarded.

f you have a forward of 6ft 8ins and 145kg, and he is not at all disturbed by a dysfunctional set-piece, you are in business.

He talked about the clarity of the leadership that helped alleviate any need for anxiety at the predicaments unfolding before him. The same cannot be said for New Zealand when they had 5 minutes left to retrieve a match winning penalty, I don't believe. Did the team in black have much of a plan at any point in the game? I don't really call an autonomous 10 vehicle they had as innovative. I think Razor needs to go back to the dealer and get a new game driver on that one.

Vaa’i is no match for his power on the ground. Even in reverse, Meafou is like a tractor motoring backwards in low gear, trampling all in its path.

Vaa'i actually stops him in his tracks. He gets what could have been a dubious 'tackle' on him?

A high-level offence will often try to identify and exploit big forwards who can be slower to reload, and therefore vulnerable to two quick plays run at them consecutively.

Yes he was just standing on his haunches wasn't he? He mentioned that in the interview, saying that not only did you just get up and back into the line to find the opposition was already set and running at you they also hit harder than anything he'd experienced in the Top 14. He was referring to New Zealands ultra-physical, burst-based Super style of course, which he was more than a bit surprised about. I don't blame him for being caught out.


He still sent the obstruction back to the repair yard though!

What wouldn’t the New Zealand rugby public give to see the likes of Mauvaka and Meafou up front..

Common now Nick, don't go there! Meafou showed his Toulouse shirt and promptly got his citizenship, New Zealand can't have him, surely?!?


As I have said before with these subjects, really enjoy your enthusiasm for their contribution on the field and I'd love to see more of their shapes running out for Vern Cotter and the like styled teams.

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