Bath v Sale

[Which Tyler]

15 Tom de Glanville, 14 Joe Cokanasiga, 13 Jonathan Joseph, 12 Cameron Redpath, 11 Will Muir, 10 Piers Francis, 9 Ben Spencer ©; 1 Lewis Boyce, 2 Tom Dunn, 3 Aranos Coetzee, 4 Dave Attwood, 5 Josh McNally, 6 Josh Bayliss, 7 Wesley White, 8 Jaco Coetzee

16 Tom Doughty, 17 Juan Schoeman, 18 Will Stuart, 19 Will Spencer, 20 GJ van Velze, 21 Louis Schreuder, 22 Orlando Bailey, 23 Richard de Carpentier




15 Luke James, 14 Tom Roebuck, 13 Sam James, 12 Manu Tuilagi, 11 Tom O'Flaherty, 10 Rob du Preez, 9 Gus Warr; 1 Simon McIntyre, 2 Akker van der Merwe, 3 Nick Schonert, 4 Cobus Wiese, 5 Jonny Hill, 6 Jean-Luc du Preez, 7 Ben Curry (c), 8 Dan du Preez

16 Ewan Ashman, 17 Ross Harrison, 18 James Harper, 19 Jono Ross, 20 Tom Curry, 21 Joe Simpson, 22 Tom Curtis, 23 Aaron Reed

[Puja]

That is a tasy-looking Bath backline on paper. Interesting to see if they manage to be good on the pitch as well.

Sale are looking threatening; I think they're going to do well this year.

Puja

[Which Tyler]

That is a tasy-looking Bath backline on paper. Interesting to see if they manage to be good on the pitch as well.

Depends if the ball is allowed out to them

[Beasties]

At first glance I thought Thanos was lined up for Bath. Would’ve been a very different game.

[fivepointer]

James Harper on the Sale bench. Good to see.

[FKAS]

That is a tasy-looking Bath backline on paper. Interesting to see if they manage to be good on the pitch as well.

Depends if the ball is allowed out to them

It's a pretty big Bath pack, they might not be blockbuster names but physically they should front up so the backs at least get a chance to throw the ball around a bit. Going to be incredibly hard to dominate but given the Sale disciplinary issues they should target parity.

[Epaminondas Pules]

That is a tasy-looking Bath backline on paper. Interesting to see if they manage to be good on the pitch as well.

Depends if the ball is allowed out to them

It's a pretty big Bath pack, they might not be blockbuster names but physically they should front up so the backs at least get a chance to throw the ball around a bit. Going to be incredibly hard to dominate but given the Sale disciplinary issues they should target parity.

Yeah, but, Ben Spencer is the scrum half. Any ball they get will be shite as he systematically kills any momentum the forwards give him.

[Which Tyler]

I think you've got the wrong SH called Ben there.

[Which Tyler]

Red card for Schonert after about 8 minutes.
Head on head tackling Dave Attwood, who wasn't particularly low himself, and actively rising into contact

[Which Tyler]

Doesn't look good for Spencer there.
For me, he's already failed the HIA without any assessment.

[Banquo]

Looks like another long season for Bath. Sale are a decent outfit but with 14 for most of the game…

[Which Tyler]

Looks like another long season for Bath. Sale are a decent outfit but with 14 for most of the game…

You'd have thought it was the other way around if you'd watched without knowing

[chris1850]

Great win for Sale.

Gus Warr again showing we don't miss Faf or Raffi with a superb MoM performance and Tom Curry demonstrating his world class qualities with 3 turnovers in the 10 minutes he was on for. ToF an inspired signing and Jonnny Hill doing everything a decent lock needs to do (yes really!). Sam James and RdP deserve mentions as well.

Really pleased with these first 2 games. Let's keep it going. Early days but we are looking good

[Banquo]

Looks like another long season for Bath. Sale are a decent outfit but with 14 for most of the game…

You'd have thought it was the other way around if you'd watched without knowing

Very strange. There are an awful lot of good players not looking good.

[Which Tyler]

Very strange. There are an awful lot of good players not looking good.

For me, we had them in the scrum, but they had us in the breakdown - and there's an awful lot more breakdowns than there are scrums.
We picked a backrow for a wider running game, and asked them to carry tight, and often on their own (especially Bayliss) - when they were standing there as decoys that it would be suicidal to pass the ball to - so we kept passing the ball to them.

No game management was particularly visible from Bath, with TdG, JJ and Redpath all standing at first receiver about as often as Francis - almost like JvG just doesn't think Fly Halves are worth bothering with, they can just be a 3rd centre, and that game management is for the coaches.
First receiver decisions seemed to be being made by rote, with no particular reference to what was happening on the pitch.

Of course, this being Bath v Sale, there was also a period of about 10-12 minutes where Bath kept taking 5m scrums, with Sale refusing to scrummage, and ultimately the ref getting bored and making Bath play away, and get turned over as they didn't know what to do with the ball if the ref isn't going to blow his whistle (at no point did the SH seem interested in anything than playing silly buggers with the Sale SH, then eventually RdC picked up and went... on his own... into Tom Curry).

Sale were good, they were determined, they knew what they were doing; Bath... didn't.

[Banquo]

Very strange. There are an awful lot of good players not looking good.

For me, we had them in the scrum, but they had us in the breakdown - and there's an awful lot more breakdowns than there are scrums.
We picked a backrow for a wider running game, and asked them to carry tight, and often on their own (especially Bayliss) - when they were standing there as decoys that it would be suicidal to pass the ball to - so we kept passing the ball to them.

No game management was particularly visible from Bath, with TdG, JJ and Redpath all standing at first receiver about as often as Francis - almost like JvG just doesn't think Fly Halves are worth bothering with, they can just be a 3rd centre, and that game management is for the coaches.
First receiver decisions seemed to be being made by rote, with no particular reference to what was happening on the pitch.

Of course, this being Bath v Sale, there was also a period of about 10-12 minutes where Bath kept taking 5m scrums, with Sale refusing to scrummage, and ultimately the ref getting bored and making Bath play away, and get turned over as they didn't know what to do with the ball if the ref isn't going to blow his whistle (at no point did the SH seem interested in anything than playing silly buggers with the Sale SH, then eventually RdC picked up and went... on his own... into Tom Curry).

Sale were good, they were determined, they knew what they were doing; Bath... didn't.

…plus ca change then

[FKAS]

It does annoy me when refs refuse to reward the dominant scrum 5m out. Don't de-power part of the game because the commentators don't like it.

[Which Tyler]

It does annoy me when refs refuse to reward the dominant scrum 5m out. Don't de-power part of the game because the commentators don't like it.

Reminiscent of 2014 - Sale just collapsed immediately, so no forward movement, and no penalty try.
He did card one of the props - so they just replaced him.
Otherwise, Sale were street smart enough to keep the penalties alternating sides, so that neither prop got too many penalties - though that in itself irritates me, it's clearly tactical and cynical, so should just be a team warning and the next one goes (and doesn't reset the penalty count when that happens).

Ultimately though, it was just an example of Bath's futility, and inability to think of anything else - tried something else twice, once when ref played an advantage - backs looked confused to have been given the ball, despite shouting for it - fumbled the thing. Second time, RdC picked and went, under orders from the ref - tried going towards teh defending SH for some strange reason, changed his mind and went right instead - straight into 2 Sale backrowers, and with no support even from his flanker on that side.