Bath Rugby’s victory over Bristol Bears on Saturday 25th October seemed even more emphatic than the scoreline suggested, according to Johann van Graan.
Johann van Graan was impressed by his Bath Rugby side’s determination to keep going in their 40-15 success against Bristol Bears at The Rec | Photo © Richard Briggs
The Blue, Black & White recovered from falling 15-5 behind in the Gallagher PREM Round 5 match at The Rec to ease to a 40-15 success. It was the ideal way to bounce back from the 22-20 defeat at Leicester Tigers in Round 4 on Saturday 18th October.
And when asked at his post-derby press conference if the result felt like a 25-point victory, van Graan said: “Felt like a bit more. Loved the attitude to keep going. Kind of felt like we had more in us.
“We start with a charge down [leading to a try for the Bears] and then we go straight back and score.
“I don’t know where that 20 minutes of [bad] weather came from. That wind was almost impossible.
“They got ahead 15-5, and then very satisfying to go into the [second] half 19-15 [in front] and then to null them in the second half.
“I thought it was a real 23-man effort. We were over the try line twice, twice the TMO [television match official] came in.
“I felt they were lucky not to concede multiple yellow cards because they were so negative on their own try line.
“But then again, I thought that six forwards coming on [from the bench in the 62nd minute] gave us a lot of energy.
“So two good sides. That was a fiery game but very satisfying.
“There’s a good level of respect between Pat [Lam, the Bears’ director of rugby] and I and the two teams.
“It’s great for the Premiership that if we want to say we want derbies, then a derby needs to be a derby, and I certainly think it is.
“It’s two very good clubs, it’s two different styles. They play their way and we play our way, and I think it’s brilliant.
“Afterwards everybody shakes hands and then we move on.
“In the PREM Cup, the irony is we play them in six days’ time [Friday 31st October] at Ashton Gate.
“But it’s great for the two clubs and you saw a very good fight between two good teams, and nobody took a backward step, and that’s what I love about the games.
“You can have a good scrap on the pitch and then afterwards you shake hands and you move on. So I think it’s healthy.
“We want to be tough to beat both sides of the ball.
“Similar to that semi-final [versus Bristol] last year, our second-half performance was satisfying.
“Obviously, they got the charge down straight away [leading to Kalaveti Ravouvou going over after only 49 seconds].
“But what I loved minute 80 onwards – I don’t know how many minutes it was, it felt like a lot, but it might have been six or seven minutes – we scored the try, then they get the penalty, we defend, we go again, we get a penalty, they get a penalty and we kept defending on our line.
“They’ve got some fantastic players. Bernhard Janse van Rensburg, who I’ve known for a long time, he just stands up every week – fantastic player… Vil Mata, Harry Thacker when he came from the bench.
“Their forward pack was good and we matched them. So, defensively, very happy with the fact that they didn’t get a bonus point and they didn’t get any points in the second half.
“Last week, we acknowledged our biggest learning out of the Leicester game was our set piece didn’t function specifically in that first half.
“We took our learning and I thought our set piece was fantastic today. They’re a very good line-out side, so I thought we won our ball, we applied pressure and we got multiple penalties from a line-out point of view.”
When asked by the Echo how far in advance it was planned to make those six changes – Kepueli Tuipulotu, Francois van Wyk, Will Stuart, Ewan Richards, Sam Underhill and Alfie Barbeary came on – van Graan said: “We do things in specific games.
“We believe in a strong impact bench, and I take you back to the Sale game [on Friday 3rd October]. You’ve got some plans in advance, but then Charlie [Ewels] got injured after four minutes, and Quinn [Roux] got injured, and then you’ve got to adapt, and you end up with Guy Pepper in the second row and Will Butt on the flank.
“So it doesn’t always work out perfectly, but [against Bristol] we did our planning and I gave them a heads-up at half-time that this will most likely happen this way.
“I felt the starting pack did so well. We were over the try line twice and then the TMO pulls us back.
“They conceded multiple penalties and then they got a turnover and I felt that was the exact right moment. I thought the way we defended, literally the 22 in that second half was amazing. They weren’t really five yards out that I can recollect now.
“It’s a real squad effort, it’s a 23-man effort, even [backs] Max [Ojomoh]and TC [Tom Carr-Smith] coming on. I thought it worked well.
“I respect Bristol, they’re a very dangerous side. On 19-15, if they score they can apply pressure. The 19-15 score was up until more than 60 minutes. So I thought we dominated the last 20.”
Regarding seven players being with the England training camp at the start of last week, van Graan said: “We trained for 25 minutes on Thursday together, so you could say that it’s not ideal, but that’s the same for all teams.
“I want as many of our guys as possible to play international rugby, and I thought well done to the players, they found solutions on the pitch, and sometimes you just got to go through it.
“We stuck to the way that we wanted to play and it’s never going to be perfect, but we scored 40 points.”
Ollie Lawrence notched one of Bath’s six tries against the Bears – and he impressed van Graan, who said: “I think there’s loads left in him. You’ve got to look at the bigger picture since his injury way back in the Six Nations [in March], and whatever happens at the national team will happen.
“His efforts and his commitment to get back is great to see and he had some big moments [against Bristol].
“The small detail in terms of helping those forwards in close-quarter combat was good and he’ll certainly keep building into the season as it progresses.”
Lawrence definitely returned with a bang after being rested for the match at Leicester.
Van Graan said: “We made that decision at the start of the block [of PREM fixtures] that he’s going to play three games, have a full week off and then play this game.
“We pre-planned that, and as with a lot of our squad we make decisions in advance, and we can always change those decisions. But similar to Max and Joe Cokanasiga and Guy, they were all rested last weekend [at Leicester] and I thought it paid off today.
“When it happened [Lawrence’s injury], if you look at the normal time that an Achilles takes, it’s very long. Ollie proves that if you’re diligent, literally 24 hours a day for a number of months, you can get things done and it’s a great story from our point of view.”
