A MOUNTAIN TO CLIMB? TOULON v BATH
Reid: jackal?
By PG Tips
December 13 2022
Bath could have a steep mountain to climb at the Stade Mayol in Toulon on Saturday. After a frustrating defeat to a less than full strength Glasgow Warriors, the prospect of facing one of European rugby’s club giants- 3 times Heineken winners a decade ago- is a daunting one. As Bath have not won a European tie since despatching London Irish in the Challenge Cup Quarter final 3 seasons ago, the omens for an away triumph are not good. This though is cup rugby, where shocks are part of the furniture. The squad will travel in hope, if not expectation.
Toulon’s position is not quite as lofty as in those days of Jonny Wilkinson inspired triumph. Currently sitting 9th in France’s Top 14, with a barely positive points difference, they struggled past URC stragglers Zebre by only 3 points in Parma last weekend. Perhaps they were complacent. Certainly their team, although based on veteran pedigree in former Italian Captain Parisse and recent Wales skipper Biggar, otherwise contained fewer notable names than usual. This weekend, fitness allowing, they could be reinforced by the likes of Tolofua, Brookes and Gigashvili in the front row or any one of Charles Ollivon, Cornell Du Preez, Facundo Isa or Matthieu Bastareaud in the back row. That’s right: the mastodon centre has transferred to the backrow, where his carrying power could be even more devastating. Luminaries behind the scrum could include former France scrum half Baptiste Serin, ex La Rochelle general Ihaia West at standoff and Springbok Cheslin Kolbe on the wing. At full strength they can be a challenging summit indeed.
Asked last week about focus and priorities, Johann van Graan made it clear that he not only loves the European contests but sets out with victory in mind every time he puts a team on the field. He may look to recent history for some encouragement as matches between the two clubs have been close encounters. Toulon edging two clashes in 2015 by a total of only 8 points when they could boast such galacticos as Michalak, O’Connor and Habana. Three seasons later with Manoa, Nonu, Trinh-Duc and Ashton in their ranks they took the home leg 24-21 before falling to Bath at the Rec 26-21. Perhaps last Saturday’s 3-point separator points to another fine-margin nail-biter?
Brighter news of injury returners is slim this month, although Lewis Boyce did feature last Saturday and Sam Underhill and Ruaridh McConnochie are reported to be close to readiness. Any or all 3 would strengthen current resources and hopefully Valeriy Morozov will have recovered from whatever forced his late withdrawal against Glasgow. Two glaring weaknesses for Bath last weekend were securing their own lineout ball and close quarter breakdown work where Glasgow either stole, or disrupted too much of Bath’s ball for comfort. There is no magic solution to the lineout issue as all available first choice jumpers, except for Ewan Richards have played recently. Coaching and support set up must be the focus there. Perhaps restoring Miles Reid to the line-up can improve performance in jackaling?
Another key issue is snap- in decision making and execution. Ben Spencer took too long over his passing (perhaps a reflection of slow ball) and box kicking, allowing the defence time to set when a more urgent approach could have paid dividends. Similarly, Piers Francis control of the game had a deliberate feel to it. If the halfbacks can lift the tempo of the game on harder Mediterranean ground, they may buy the threequarters that extra half second to get them on the front foot. Even with slow ball there were flashes of quality and penetration from Redpath, Lawrence, De Glanville and particularly Gallagher in the Warriors match. Those exciting individual sparks need to be fanned into concerted flame to turn the heat on the hosts.
Lose and Bath’s European adventure will fizzle out once again. Win and last week’s loss will seem less damaging. The climb may appear a steep one but heights are there to be scaled, summits to be reached. Bath must travel with intent to win and enjoy the view.
Possible Teams:
Bath: Morozov, Dunn, Rae, Lee-Warner, Attwood, Hill, Reid, Bayliss. Spencer (Capt.), Bailey. Gallagher, Redpath, Lawrence, Cokanasiga, De Glanville.
Replacements: Boyce, Annett, Jonker, Spencer, Underhill. Schreuder, Ojomoh, Butt.
Toulon: Devaux, Tolofua, Gigashvili, Halagahu, Warion, Du Preez, Ollivon, Parisse. Serin, Biggar. Drean, Samili, Sinzelle, Kolbe. Luc.
Replacements: Fifita, Baubigny, Brookes, Tanguy, Bastareaud. Paillauge, West, Cordin.
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Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2022:12:20:10:47:26 by P G Tips.
Adopted Player 2018/19 Ross Batty
Adopted Player 2019/20 Jack Davies
Adopted Player 2020/21 Cam Redpath
Adopted Player 2021/22 Darren Atkins
Adopted Player 2022/23 Gabriel Hamer-Webb
Adopted Player 2023/24 Tom Carr-Smith
Adopted Player 2024/25 Max Ojomoh
"AN OUNCE OF ACTION IS WORTH A TON OF THEORY"
FRIEDRICH ENGELS
PG
Quote:nick holder
For me, out of Europe before Christmas, again!
Will 100% lose the game, but looking on the bright side I'm going and Toulon is my favourite place to watch rugby so not all bad.
Bath Rugby team to play Toulon
15 Tom de Glanville, 14 Joe Cokanasiga, 13 Ollie Lawrence, 12 Max Ojomoh, 11 Will Butt, 10 Piers Francis, 9 Ben Spencer ©; 1 Lewis Boyce, 2 Tom Dunn, 3 D’Arcy Rae, 4 Dave Attwood, 5 Fergus Lee-Warner, 6 Tom Ellis, 7 Miles Reid, 8 Richard de Carpentier
Impact players
16 Tom Doughty, 17 Valeriy Morozov, 18 Johannes Jonker, 19 Will Spencer, 20 Josh Bayliss, 21 Max Green, 22 Orlando Bailey, 23 Ted Hill
P G Tips
Jaco Coetzee: my adopted Player, 2023-24.
Handling isn’t our strong point in the dry so might be problematic tomorrow.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2022:12:16:12:48:35 by OutsideBath.
Quote:OutsideBath
Handling isn’t our strong point in the dry so might be problematic tomorrow.
Just means more kick tennis doesn't it?
[24/25 adoptee: Francois van Wyk]
Quote:BathMatt53Quote:OutsideBath
Handling isn’t our strong point in the dry so might be problematic tomorrow.
Just means more kick tennis doesn't it?
If kick tennis was going to win us the game I’d be satisfied with that, however it won’t.
Looking at the team we have selected it doesn’t seem like we’re going all out to win the game with flowing rugby.
Quote:Malco
I think we'll win this game.
I’m with you on this Malco (albeit mostly because I like a bold prediction) and, watching very little French rugby, I’ve heard of very few of their side. It’s actually a pretty physically impressive 23 we’ve named - 2 huge wingers, 3 huge locks, big back row, good replacements.
Adopted Player 2018/19 Ross Batty
Adopted Player 2019/20 Jack Davies
Adopted Player 2020/21 Cam Redpath
Adopted Player 2021/22 Darren Atkins
Adopted Player 2022/23 Gabriel Hamer-Webb
Adopted Player 2023/24 Tom Carr-Smith
Adopted Player 2024/25 Max Ojomoh
"AN OUNCE OF ACTION IS WORTH A TON OF THEORY"
FRIEDRICH ENGELS
Quote:CoochieCoo
We haven’t left base camp yet!
We have now! But not very far!
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2022:12:17:15:41:42 by OutsideBath.
Quote:Mike the TaxiQuote:CoochieCoo
We haven’t left base camp yet!
We have now! But not very far!
It's all over sacre bleu, blanc and [mostly] noir...
Adopted players: 24/25 J Bayliss; [24] O Lawrence; [23] J Cokanasiga; [22] M Green; [21] A Watson; [20] T Faletau; [19] M V Vuuren; [18] T Faletau; [17] D Denton; [16] H. Agulla; [15] L Houston; [14] W Spencer; [13] F. Louw
Family . Community . Nation - [sdp.org.uk]
My mind's been going places without me lately - Bushfire The B52's
Quote:OptimistQuote:Malco
I think we'll win this game.
I’m with you on this Malco (albeit mostly because I like a bold prediction) and, watching very little French rugby, I’ve heard of very few of their side. It’s actually a pretty physically impressive 23 we’ve named - 2 huge wingers, 3 huge locks, big back row, good replacements.
What I meant to say was ….
Quote:B4thB4ck
Sounds like we needed Mountaun Rescue and a St Bernard...
To start with all we needed was an effective scrum and lineout. If we had those two facets of the game we would have at least been competitive.
Things may well have improved by a small fraction under JvG, however coaching, or lack of, is still our fundamental weakness.
The scrum was destroyed from the outset and the only lineouts we won were when Toulon didn’t compete. The basic handling is awful and the attacking strategy is non existent.
When you compare Toulon (who are bottom half of the top 14) with Bath they have leaders all over the pitch and non more so than Parrise. Where are Bath’s leaders?
We can’t even make the last 16 of the challenge cup, which in itself is pretty embarrassing.
On the bright side there is no better place to watch rugby than Toulon so it has still been a great weekend despite result.
Won 3
Lost 13
adopted player, 24/25 Hame Faiva. 23/24 Ted Hill. 22/23 Cam Redpath. 21/22 Max Clark. 20/21 Henry Thomas. 19/20 Max Wright. 18/19 Cooper Vuna.
Quote:OutsideBath
It’s difficult to play rugby when you have no effective scrum or lineout.
And it raises the question again. Is Hateley the right person to coach the forwards?
Quote:Bath HammerQuote:OutsideBath
It’s difficult to play rugby when you have no effective scrum or lineout.
And it raises the question again. Is Hateley the right person to coach the forwards?
Or are the forwards good enough?
A 24 stone South African will shore up the scrum, and Ewels will hopefully improve the Lineout.
Some very good players coming back from injury will also improve the pack
Widcombe Garçon
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2022:12:18:08:35:09 by Widcombe Boy.
Obviously the lineout is complicated. But Luke Charteris got this job with no experience and he has demonstrated literally nothing to show he is even close to good enough. Hatley... he has some credit in the bank from previous gigs and our maul seems to be decent enough this year. Our lineout is a joke. It was last year. It is this year. You cannot run a forward-based game plan on a lineout this bad. Charteris absolutely has to be replaced.
Quote:Widcombe BoyQuote:Bath HammerQuote:OutsideBath
It’s difficult to play rugby when you have no effective scrum or lineout.
And it raises the question again. Is Hateley the right person to coach the forwards?
Or are the forwards good enough?
A 24 stone South African will sure up the scrum, and Ewels will hopefully improve the Lineout.
Some very good players coming back from injury will also improve the pack
That’s possibly true, but little consolation now the season is over for Bath.
Can anyone remember the last time we stole opposition ball at a line-out? I certainly can't. Just terrible.
Saying Charlie Ewells will fix it makes me laugh as he was totally anonymous last season for Bath as a captain and a player. If we want to guarantee our ball against bigger sides we need box clever and use Myles more as we can lift him high and quickly as there is no law stating that you have to throw to a second row.
We have been using Bayliss as well but we need to vary our jumpers all the time and keep the opposition guessing and as for me FLW is our best second row by a mile but he is the athletic one and we need our "big" men Attwod and Spencer to impose themselves more IMHO.
Any scrum in the world would struggle playing against an 8 that had 100 more kgs of muscle and power and Boyce was clearly struggling or in the refs bad books. In fact i think that all considering the scrum went as well as can be expected and never gave up the fight but we need more bulk in the team and a 24 stone saffer will certainly bring that and he can play both sides of the scrum which is a bonus especially that must be question marks over Obanos long term fitness.
We also missed some great opportunities to get back into the game and were still creating scoring opportunities but were let down by basic passing skills. We certainly lack composure and dare i say it structure in the back line and we were going wide too early. We need to settle on our pairings at half back and in the center so that the relationships that generate composure and structure are in place. There is too much chopping and changing in my opinion
I have not watched the match but did read this thread.
For some reason no one mentions the score above...............so I was bracing myself for 50 - 0.......60 - 0
Now I never want to lose a match, indeed a little bit of me always expect us to win. So 29 - 7 defeat was significantly better than I expected.
It really would not surprise me if we beat them at the Rec on the 14th....
It would seem that JVG has the view he needs to protect our young talent such as Bailey, Richards and others and play senior players in key positions such as 9 and 10. It might also be that JvG feels some of the forwards are simply not good enough.
The problem is we don’t have a quality 10 either and that is why a fly half like Finn Russell is absolutely vital.
It is clear from observing Saints and Tigers that the loss of Biggar and Ford has dramatically affected those teams form.
We currently have a stand in 10 in Piers Francis with our only permanent real 10 being Bailey who despite having Callard as kicking coach has seen his kicking form drop badly.
We need Russell and/or his like desperately clearly Searle isn’t long term.
We don’t even have all the ingredients for 10 man rugby yet so it’s slow progress until that basic goal is achieved.
Opti aspires to a epiphany of the type seen in English cricket in English rugby.
The only equivalent is demonstrated by Leinster where front row forwards step in at 9 and immediately throw scoring passes.
That sort of ‘total rugby’ has taken time to mature with the likes of Cullen and Lancaster patiently developing a rugby culture. The same Lancaster dismissed by some on this board as well as by Chris Ashton.
I agree that Lancaster won’t get an England post but only because he is streets ahead in his rugby coaching and diametrically opposite to the rugby philosophy of the RFU.
His return to international coaching is only a matter of time though I suspect not to England.
The one thing that is blatantly apparent is that the 3 year "trial" appointment with Stuart Hooper at DoR was largely a waste of time with few of that playing or coaching squad being utilised going forward, the only redeeming feature seems to have been his involvement with the academy.
Quote:Bath Supporter Jack
Goodness
I have not watched the match but did read this thread.
For some reason no one mentions the score above...............so I was bracing myself for 50 - 0.......60 - 0
Now I never want to lose a match, indeed a little bit of me always expect us to win. So 29 - 7 defeat was significantly better than I expected.
It really would not surprise me if we beat them at the Rec on the 14th....
BSJ, you really had to be there to appreciate how pathetic Bath were. Scrum was totally overrun, lineout was the usual rubbish, attack non existent and the score totally flattered us.
The most irritating thing for me was the one time Ben Spencer tries a quick tap and go. One successful pass followed by winger dropping a simple pass with acres of space in front of him. Catch the ball and we score, but we play as though the ball covered in butter.
The handling of the Toulon players was a joy to watch. We can only dream if such quality play.
In Parisse they also have the type of leader on the pitch that we just don’t have.
Thanks for the feedback.
On the last game thread I set out 10 points where I was fed up.....handling was one of them!!
Quote:Bath Supporter Jack
I was bracing myself for 50 - 0.......60 - 0. So 29 - 7 defeat was significantly better than I expected
If you lose the business end of the game 22-0, it's much the same as a 50-0 defeat.