Unfortunately it was a Welford Road walloping for Bristol Bears this weekend and this time even John ‘Superman’ Afoa could not save us.
With a hugely important European Champions Cup quarter-final game against Leinster coming up, we talked on last week’s podcast with rational, or maybe in hindsight, hopeful thought, that Tigers might have rested a few of their star players. How wrong could we have been, as we faced the full force of the Premiership league leaders.
Rather than regurgitating our shortcomings in this game, I would prefer to take a look at where we go from here.
There is no doubt Pat Lam has been a breath of fresh air since coming to BS3, he has taken on an eternally underachieving team, shaken them by the proverbial and turned us into the Premiership version of the Barbarians.
We have been privileged and blessed to watch breath-taking Rugby of the highest quality. He has taken us to a top placing in the league and delivered the first piece of European silverware in our 134-year history with the Challenge Cup.
But, in the cold, harsh unforgiving climate that is professional sport, these events are now assigned to the annals of history. Lam is a forward-thinking coach that sets the highest standards of everyone. He knows every facet of the Bears set up because he created, shaped and formed it. The culture has been driven by him. He is a hard taskmaster who would admit to having only interest in the future.
Has some of the Lam factor seeped fear into our game at times? Has the worry of letting the boss down affected some of the decisions on the field? Have we really had the best value for money from a couple of our star performers?
When the final curtain has closed on this season, when frank truths and mistakes have been addressed, hands have been held up in apology, when the summer sun has erased the physicality and brutality of the winter. I would like to see variations to the theme, practical tweaks and a backup plan when the system isn’t working. Better game management.
I want Lam to reinvent and re-galvanise, to become the innovator again. I still want ‘Bristol Bearbarians’ but with a little more substance.
You can listen to this week’s Bears Beyond the Gate podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Spotify and Buzzsprout
