Go To The Right Of Jason's Feet To Catch Him!

By Alastair Beaven
December 23 2004

The Christmas turkey is well into it’s fifth meal and bodies are straining with an excess of food and a lack of exercise, a good time for a 3-hour journey North. After the excitement of European and domestic cup games, it’s back to the coalface for a Zurich Premiership clash with Sale Sharks.

The Sharks are one of those teams whose name almost prompts a call to the Trading Standards Office, similar to the Wycombe Wasps and Reading English, however, after a difficult start, they have settled in well to their new Edgeley Park home in the centre of Stockport and were top of the shop leading up to the Autumn internationals. It will be interesting to see how a ‘injury affected’ Bath front up to a full strength Sale team who found out this year how important it is to have a large talented squad. Fans from Bath, Leicester etc chuckled as Sale lost all three games during the Autumn Internationals and then blamed England for robbing all the talent, welcome to the real world boys, we’ve being doing it for 20 odd years.

Turning to the game, for Bath to win this fixture they will have to play with intensity up front to prevent the ball getting out to the likes of Hanley and the awesome Cueto. Whichever flankers are fit will have to be in Mr. Hodgson’s face for the whole match and rely on Olly/Molly’s kicking for field position and DG and Borthers to continue their excellent form in the line-outs.

Of course there’s the ever-present threat of a certain Mr. Robinson to deal with as well (that’s Jason, not our own Andy), my advice is, watch his boots and tackle about three feet to the right of them, he’s bound to shimmy into your arms at some point.

Unlike last year, expect Hercus to kick the points for any Bath digression in the Sharks half. The ever increasing Stockport crowd will be passionate and noisy, who have only the Sharks to cheer for with the demise of Stockport County in the roundball game.

With this new crop of Northern heroes expect a very warm welcome for the boys in Blue, Black and White. Any other year, a Bath win, this year, however, with all our injuries, too close to call.

Here’s hoping for a Bath victory. Merry Christmas and A Happy New Year from Mr. And Mrs Alibev and the little Bevlets.

Bath Team (probable): 15 Matt Perry, 14 Andrew Higgins, 13 Frikkie Welsh, 12 Olly Barkley, 11 Brendon Daniel, 10 Chris Malone, 9 Nick Walshe, 1 David Barnes, 2 Jonathan Humphreys (capt), 3 Duncan Bell, 4 Rob Fidler, 5 Danny Grewcock, 6 Andy Beattie, 7 Michael Lipman, 8 Zak Feaunati

Replacements from: Matt Stevens, Heinrich Kok, Steve Borthwick, James Hudson, James Scaysbrook, Geraint Lewis, Andy Williams, Mike Baxter, Tom Cheeseman, Ryan Davis.

Sale Team: Jason Robinson, Mark Cueto, Jos Baxendell, Robert Todd, Steve Hanley, Charlie Hodgson, Sililo Martens, Andrew Sheridan, Sebastien Bruno, Barry Stewart, Dean Schofield, Chris Day, Jason White, John Carter, Sebastien Chabal.

Replacements From: Andy Titterrell, Stuart Turner, Johnny Roddam, Chris Jones, Peter Anglesea, Richard Wigglesworth, Mike Hercus, Chris Rhys Jones and Chris Mayor.