Bath Beat Sarries - Six From Six!

Bath took the lead after just four minutes as Saracens started their spoiling tactics and were immediately penalised by referee Rowden. The Bath score could have been greater had Rowden followed up this early decision with more throughout the game but he decision to even up the match by allowing the Londoners to defend most rucks from an offside position and generally spoil the open forward play. The Bath crowd shouted their derision at the referee as he missed infringement after infringement but to be fair, he was not helped at all by the touch judges. On one occasion Rowden told the teams the ball was out of a Saracen's ruck but when the Bath players stepped over to grab the ball he penalised them! Savvy Sarries took full advantage of this ineptitude, and fair play to them because we would have done the same, but it spoiled the game as a spectacle.

Two minutes later Bath conceded a penalty after Chris Malone had his clearance kick charged down but Goode missed this opportunity to draw level. Malone still looks ponderous with his clearance kicks and today he seemed to have an attacks of the "Catt's" - too many attempted miss-moves going horribly wrong and drawing our backline out of position. Brendan Daniel looked frustrated, from his position on the wing, and Andrew Higgins looked unsure at centre as he dropped more than his share of simple passes. Once again Lee Best was sharp and keen to set up attacks and it will be a great disappointment for the player and his team if his injury is as serious as initial reports suggest.

But Sarries only had to wait a couple of minutes to score and this time they succeeded in drawing level; unfortunately for them this was to be their only score of the afternoon. Andy Goode may have had a bad day with his place kicking but he is great to watch because he is always trying something new to gain an advantage for his team. Unfortunately for the ex-Tiger his boots were not cashing the cheques his rugby-brain was writing and every attempt to off-balance the Bath defence came up short on success.

The rest of the first half saw both teams trading territory and possession and the main difference was that Bath, through Olly Barkley, took their scoring chances whereas Saracens didn't. For me the highlight of the first half was watching Ashley Rowden run backwards at speed some 25 yards across the pitch - he's had that Roger Kirkpatrick "How Referees Should Run Backwards" video out from Blockbusters again!

As a pretty dreary half was drawing to a close Jonathan Humphreys won a scrum against the head, despite Patrick Phibbs feeding his back row Rugby League style, and this led to another penalty. Unfortunately Barkley was injured and so Chris Malone took the kick, but the young Aussie missed. However within a few moments Matt Perry picked the ball up in his own half and dashed up field before feeding Brendan Daniel who set up Andy Beattie for what seemed a certain try but the Saracens' defence held firm. The resulting lineout saw Sarries hooker, James Parkes, throw the ball through his forwards in to the hands of a very grateful Michael Lipman who dived for the line to score: half time - 14-3.

The second half took up where the first had left off and Saracens appeared to be drifting out of the game, however they gave Bath a real scare as Andy Goode took advantage of a mis-move error in midfield when his cross-kick nearly exposed a massive hole in the Bath defence. Luckily for the home team the ball bounced in to touch when on another day it could easily have set up Richard Haughton for a score.

A very late try from substitute Alex Crockett extended the winning score and made Bath's victory look easier than it actually was. Both teams will be unhappy with this performance but at least Bath grabbed the four points and are unbeaten all season, Saracens have a lot of work to do if they are to progress up the league table.

Let's have a look at the latest league table.

Scorers

Bath: Perry, Best, Higgins, Barkley, Daniel, Malone, Wood, Flatman, Humphreys, Bell, Borthwick, Fidler, Beattie, Lipman, Fea'unati.

Referee: Ashley Rowden