Bath v Newcastle: Five takeaways as England star returns with a ‘bang’ and Arundell bags four
Bath v Newcastle: Five takeaways as England star returns with a 'bang' and Arundell bags four
Following Bath’s 69-12 victory over Newcastle Red Bulls in the Gallagher PREM, here are our five takeaways from the Recreation Ground clash.
The top line
Henry Arundell helped himself to four tries as 14-man Bath crushed Newcastle to snap a run of three straight defeats and confirm their place in the Gallagher PREM semi-finals.
The West Countrymen bounced back from losses to Northampton, Bordeaux and Exeter with an 11-try romp against hapless opponents, keeping alive their hopes of all-important home advantage in the post-season.
Victory came at a cost, with Tom Dunn red-carded for a dangerous tackle before half-time, which could cost him a suspension. But Max Ojomoh’s stunning cameo on his return from injury rebalanced the ledger.
Try-fest which tells us nothing
Arundell moved joint-third in the PREM try charts with a four-timer, which gives him 12 for the league campaign. Two either side of half-time took his tally to 22 in 24 appearances for club and country.
But this game proved nothing as the English champions were never at risk of defeat. All they could hope to do was restore the feel-good factor after their three-game blip and avoid injury. Both those boxes were ticked.
The real tests lie ahead for Johann van Graan’s side. Bristol were humiliated as never before by Northampton on Friday night. Their next game is in front of their own fans against Bath. You can bet they will be up for that.
Then, on the final afternoon of the regular season, Leicester visit the Rec; Tigers, the league’s in-form club, the East Midland juggernaut, tearing up the table and fancying their chances in a big way of denying Bath home advantage in the post-season.
Those two games will be huge contests. This was nothing of the sort. Bath had a bonus point in the bag after 24 minutes. Losing a man slowed their scoring rate either side of the break, but the Bath bomb squad put that right in the final quarter.
Sharks player ratings: Springbok stars shine while 18-year-old ‘revelation’ secures first try
Dunn’s big day turns sour
When Tom Dunn, aka the ‘mayor of Bath’, ran out at the start, all was right in his world.
He was singled out and lauded by his club for reaching 267 appearances, a Bath record in the professional era. He had his three children beside him as he received the acclaim of a sell-out crowd.
Five unanswered tries later, Bath were romping towards half-time with a 31-point lead, and thoughts were already turning to the games against Bristol and Leicester.
In an instant, it all turned sour for the popular hooker. Newcastle captain George McGuigan took the ball to the line and was met by his opposite number, head-on-head.
Ian Tempest was alerted to the incident by TMO Andrew Jackson, and a couple of replays later, the referee brandished a 20-minute red card the way of the 33-year-old.
There was no great price to pay for Bath on this day as the result was already in the bag, but it could come at a cost further down the line. Losing Dunn to a ban would hurt their chances against Tigers and whoever they face in the semi-finals.
Ojomoh back with a bang
If Dunn’s departure was a blow to Bath going forward, Max Ojomoh’s appearance off the bench for the final quarter was reason for significant cheer.
The England centre has been a huge miss for the champs in recent weeks, and the fear was that it might take him a while to get back up to speed. Bath fans needn’t have worried. For 20 minutes, Ojomoh shredded Newcastle.
Bath scored six tries in that time, all of which had the midfielder’s fingerprints on in front of England greats Jeremy Guscott and Will Carling.
Ojomoh started by double-pumping to send Arundell over for his hat-trick, then twice in three minutes executed perfectly a wraparound play with Finn Russell to give Santi Carreras a brace.
Not done with that, he and Russell put Arundell in again, then cleverly and instinctively flipped up a loose ball from the restart to Dan Frost, who ran it back from halfway, before offloading for Chris Harris to end the scoring against the side he joins this summer.
“He’s wonderfully talented,” said Jamie Roberts, the Wales and Lions legend who knows all there is to know about centre play. “He has all the tools to be a top Test player.”
Newcastle go from bad to worse
When Red Bull announced their full takeover of Newcastle at the start of the season, the joke was it would give them wings – and a whole lot more besides.
The fans bought into the dream. A bumper 10,210 crowd – Newcastle’s biggest for a Prem game since 2018 – pitched up for the season opener. But Saracens won that game at a canter, and the Georgie outfit have won only once in the league since.
The reality is the club was plunged into limbo by the takeover, as the investment fans hoped would pay an immediate dividend, arrived too late and had to be redirected into next season.
Barely a week has passed without a signing being announced, 23 to date. Yet on the field, the news has been relentlessly bad. This 69-point battering followed a 76-home shellacking by Harlequins a week ago.
Before that, there were the 73 points conceded at Saracens, the 62 at Leicester and the half centuries against Bristol, Bath, Harlequins and Sale.
Victory at Bath would have been their first in the league away from home for 42 months. Unsurprisingly, it never threatened.