Bath v Edinburgh: Five takeaways as England beckons for Max Ojomoh and ‘bowling ball’ forward while front-row ‘party trick’ happens again
Alfie Barbeary was in fine form for Bath.
Following a 63-10 win for Bath over Edinburgh in the Investec Champions Cup, here’s our five takeaways from the game at the Recreation Ground.
The top line
Bath hammered Edinburgh in a display of forward dominance that settled Pool 2 and guaranteed home advantage through the knockout rounds. The front-row claimed four tries, including Thomas du Toit, Beno Obano, Tom Dunn and a penalty try, whilst Alfie Barbeary took Player of the Match honours, the bowling ball effect he brought creating a platform that turned this into a procession rather than a contest.
But the real story was Max Ojomoh, absolutely brilliant in the 12 shirt, making three tries with his vision and execution, scoring one himself, the kind of complete centre performance that has England beckons written all over it when you consider what the national team lacks in terms of genuine playmaking threat in the 12 shirt.
Guy Pepper deserves his own paragraph because he’s the unsung hero of this Bath side, tireless and phenomenal in everything he does, the kind of player who doesn’t show up in highlight reels but makes absolutely everything function properly through sheer work rate and intelligence at the breakdown and in defence – and has the best hands on a back-row forward in the country.
Edinburgh’s decision to rest several players backfired catastrophically, the weakened side getting annihilated in a way that has destroyed their points differential and could consign them to a nightmare away knockout tie.
Front-row union
Bath’s front-row turned the Rec into their personal try-scoring laboratory on Friday night, and by half-time they’d already claimed four touchdowns in a display Edinburgh simply couldn’t contain.
Du Toit opened the account on 15 minutes, Obano powered over on 31, Dunn got his just before the break, and sandwiched between them came a penalty try on 18 minutes that the front-row are almost certainly claiming as their own in the dressing room right now, given it came from another scrum demolition job that left the referee with no choice but to award seven points under the posts.
This is the second time this season Bath have managed this particular party trick of having their entire front-row on the scoresheet in a single match, having pulled it off once already in Prem action, and what’s remarkable isn’t just the volume of tries but the variety of ways they’re getting over the line, from close-range pick-and-drives to maul domination to scrum penalties that become inevitable scores.
Edinburgh came to Bath without their strongest pack, and whilst that might have been strategic thinking for the bigger URC picture, it left them completely outgunned in the grunt work tonight, their set-piece struggling to generate any platform while Bath’s front three essentially decided to take matters into their own hands and bypass the backs entirely.
Bowling ball
Barbeary turned in the kind of performance that earned him Player of the Match honours and makes you wonder what England are waiting for, his 14 carries generating 61 metres with 11 of them dominant, but those numbers barely capture the bowling ball effect he brought every single time he touched the ball. Each carry going through contact rather than around it, forcing Edinburgh defenders backwards and creating the kind of go-forward momentum that opens up everything else Bath wanted to do in attack.
The clean break he made was the headline moment, but it was the cumulative effect of his carrying that really mattered. The way he kept Bath on the front foot, kept Edinburgh scrambling, kept the tempo high and the pressure relentless, 11 dominant carries out of 14, telling you everything you need to know about how physically imposing he was throughout the 80 minutes.
He was the centre of everything brilliant Bath produced, not just because of what he did with ball-in-hand but because of the threat he posed, the way Edinburgh had to commit extra numbers to him, which created space elsewhere, the way his physical presence kept stretching their defensive line until eventually something had to give.
England have Ben Earl at eight and he brings a completely different skill-set with his linking play and work rate, but there’s surely room for Barbeary’s raw ball-carrying power somewhere in that back-row mix, the kind of direct threat that can change the nature of a game when you need someone to simply bend the line and generate quick ball, yet somehow he’s still waiting for that first cap.
Edinburgh indiscipline
Edinburgh coughed up eight penalties in that first half alone, which is a damning statistic when you consider they’ve been averaging six per game up until tonight, and when you’re giving Bath that kind of invitation to build pressure and territory at the Recreation Ground, you’re essentially handing them the keys to the game before it’s even properly started.
The scrum was the worst of it, repeatedly shoved backwards by a Bath front-row that smelled blood from the opening exchanges and never let up, driving through Edinburgh’s pack with such force that the penalty try became inevitable and was just confirmation of what everyone in the ground already knew.
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But there were glimpses tonight of what this young Edinburgh side might become when they get a bit more seasoning and learn how to manage these high-pressure European away trips without imploding at set-piece time. Freddie Douglas was outstanding at the breakdown, constantly disrupting Bath’s flow and winning turnovers when everything else was going wrong around him.
Harry Paterson beat five defenders over the evening in running that suggested genuine class in the making, all footwork and balance and acceleration through tight spaces, and his set-up for Piers O’Conor’s try was absolutely spellbinding, the kind of vision and execution that creates something from nothing and reminds you why people get excited about promising young backs.
Pool implications
Bath have clearly answered any uncertainty about seeding and home advantage with this Investec Champions Cup victory that takes them to 16 points and guarantees them hosting rights through the Round of 16 and into the quarter-finals if they progress, the kind of comprehensive statement that settles pool winners and ensures they’ll be playing knockout rugby at the Rec for as long as their European campaign lasts.
The magnitude of this result goes far beyond the simple mathematics of four points for the win and one for the try bonus, because that 53-point margin has absolutely destroyed Edinburgh’s points differential and created chaos in the battle for the remaining three qualification spots from what was the tightest pool in the competition. Edinburgh drop to 10 points but more damagingly see their differential crater from -18 to -71, which could prove catastrophic when it comes to overall seeding across the 16 qualifiers, potentially consigning them to a nightmare away trip in the knockouts rather than the home tie they were dreaming of before kick-off.
Toulon on nine points now have a genuine shot at leapfrogging Edinburgh into second place if they can get a result at Gloucester tomorrow, whilst Munster and Gloucester on six points each still harbour hopes of sneaking into the top four if results fall their way, with Castres on five needing a bonus point win at Thomond Park and other results to go their way to avoid dropping into the Challenge Cup altogether, the whole pool still alive going into the final round but Bath having comprehensively settled the question of who wins it.