Bristol Bears continued their climb up the Premiership table with a 51-26 win over Harlequins at Ashton Gate on Sunday to go seventh in the standings.
The Bears scored seven tries in all with Harry Thacker and Charles Piutau both recording braces and Gabriel Ibitoye, Semi Radradra and Harry Randall all crossing the line. AJ MacGinty added 11 points from the tee before James Williams took over kicking responsibilities to add five points
Harlequins flanker Jack Kenningham also scored a brace from close-range drives while wingers Josh Bassett and Cadan Murley ensured the visitors to Ashton Gate returned home with an attacking bonus point.
After four Premiership wins on the bounce, Bristol are now seven points from the play-off places with a game in hand over their rivals. Harlequins sit eighth.
READ MORE: Bristol Bears 51-26 Harlequins LIVE: Full reaction from bonus point win at Ashton Gate
Reflecting on the uptick in form, Bristol director of rugby Pat Lam said: "I am extremely pleased for the boys. We have won four Premiership games in a row, we did the work for it and have got our rewards with 19 out of a possible 20 points.
"This run has got us into the Champions Cup zone, now we have got a break and four more games so we have a great opportunity to push on towards the top four and get ready for Europe.
"It is a big win for us because we knew if we win we would climb above Harlequins.
"We have been in this type of knockout rugby scenario before when we won the Challenge Cup. Being successful is about making sure everyone is clear on our game plan and on their role and work hard."
In recent years this fixture, between two of the great entertainers in the Premiership, has become something of a grudge match as Harlequins ripped up Lam’s ambitious plans for the club by coming back from 28-0 down in the 2020/21 play-off semi-final to win 43-36 before going on to lift the trophy at Twickenham a week later.
The Bears have seemingly been gripped in an existential identity crisis ever since but looked to have rediscovered their mojo since the turn of the year.
The last meeting between the two sides, a 15-12 victory for Bristol in the rain at the Stoop, was not without controversy with Harlequins prop Joe Marler banned afterwards for bringing the game into disrepute by insulting the ill mother of Bears flanker Jake Heenan.
Heading into the return fixture, Lam made just one injury-enforced change to his starting side that record the club’s biggest ever Premiership win last weekend, thrashing Northampton 62-8, with flanker Sam Jeffries dropping out of the side and former All Black Steven Luatua coming in to co-captain the side.
Harlequins boss Tabai Matson faced bigger disruption to his side that comprehensively beat play-off rivals Exeter Chiefs 40-5 at Twickenham last week in the Big Game 14, losing man of the match and key fly-half playmaker Marcus Smith to England duty along with Joe Marchant, while young hooker Sam Riley came into the front row for George Head.
With Smith away with England and second choice fly-half Tommaso Allan on international duty with Italy, Will Edwards was handed the number 10 jersey while Luke Northmore returned at outside centre.
Right from the kick-off the game live up to the billing as Bristol wasted little time in opening the scoring with hooker Thacker spinning off the side of a maul from a 5m lineout to dot the ball down in the corner. But the lead was short lived as Kenningham dived over a ruck to finish from close range after sustained bombardment by the visiting forwards.
The tries continued to flow in the dry conditions in BS3 with Piutau unlocking the Londoners’ defence with an out the back of the hand offload to Ibitoye who cut in off the left wing to run in under the posts, celebrating before dotting down against his former club.
Shortly after Siva Naulago had a try disallowed for a knock on in the build-up as he stripped the ball but the Bears fans only had to wait a couple of minutes to celebrate again as this time the Fijian winger fooled the Harlequins’ defence with a dummy run to open up a gap for Thacker who finished an arcing run under the posts which started off the top of a lineout 20m out.
Within 24 minutes the hosts had the attacking bonus point wrapped up as fly-half MacGinty delayed a pass beautifully before hitting Radradra on a straight line which again ended under the uprights.
Harlequins hit back with a nice foray down the left wing, working an overlap to put Dino Lamb away along the touchline before the lock passed back inside despite the attempted cover tackle of Naulago, to allow Bassett to finish the cutting move.
USA international MacGinty added a penalty to take his tally to 11 points before limping off shortly before half time with a knee injury to be replaced by Sam Bedlow.
Bristol opened the scoring in the second half with a penalty from the boot of James Williams. Kenningham then powered over from close range for his second of the game before the Bears responded with a superb purple patch to blow the game out of the water.
First Randall sniped his way over shortly before Harlequins lost hooker Sam Riley to the sin bin for a high tackle. With the extra man, Piutau finished two wonderful, sweeping 15-man attacking moves to continue his rich rein of personal form.
Murley then intercepted a pass from a Sam Bedlow and ran in from 80m to ensure his side returned up the M4 with at least an attacking bonus point for their efforts as both sides head into a weekend off.
Bristol Bears: 15. Charles Piutau, 14. Siva Naulago, 13. Semi Radradra, 12. James Williams, 11. Gabriel Ibitoye, 10. AJ MacGinty, 9. Harry Randall (co-capt); 1. Yann Thomas, 2. Harry Thacker, 3. Max Lahiff, 4. Joe Batley, 5. Chris Vui, 6. Steven Luatua (co-capt), 7. Fitz Harding, 8. Magnus Bradbury.
Replacements: 16. Bryan Byrne, 17. Jake Woolmore, 18.George Kloska, 19. Joe Joyce, 20. Jake Heenan, 21. Andy Uren, 22. Sam Bedlow, 23. Ioan Lloyd.
Harlequins: 15. Nick David, 14. Cadan Murley, 13. Luke Northmore, 12. Andre Esterhuizen, 11. Josh Bassett, 10. Will Edwards, 9. Danny Care, 1. Sin Baxter, 2. Sam Riley, 3. Wilco Louw , 4. Dino Lamb, 5. Stephan Lewies (C), 6. Jack Kenningham, 7. James Chisholm, 8. Tom Lawday.
Replacements: 16. Jack Musk, 17. Joe Marler, 18. Will Collier, 19. Irne Herbst, 20. Luke Wallace, 21. Hayden Hyde 22. Scott Steele, 23. Oscar Beard.
Referee: Adam Leal (26th Premiership game).
Assistant Referees: Joe James and Gareth Holsgrove.
TMO: David Rose.
Citing Officer: Duncan Bell.
