After a few tricky weeks the club had a great opportunity to inject some major feel good into BS3 with the arrival of a South African XV to face a Bears side eager to claim a national scalp in front of record sell out crowd.
This wasn’t a ‘hastily arranged’ match to compensate for a disrupted fixture list but rather a pre-planned marketing coup that caught the imagination of rugby lovers across the city and, I heard on the grapevine, even a few Bath fans!
Those expecting to see the likes of Kolisi, Eztebeth and Kolbe may have been at touch disappointed but with the full national team facing Italy two days later the majority realised way in advance that it would be the understudies gracing the Ashton Gate stage.
Ultimately, though, it didn’t matter. Not only did the Bears win (and we’re talking about a city vanquishing a whole country here) but the match day experience was much improved with a real buzz circulating around the ground.
Pat Lam has always said that we need to be world class at things that matter and as such the South Standers rose to the occasion by nailing one of the best Mexican waves seen this side of the Yucatan Peninsula.
But we also saw improvements on the pitch with the Bears delivering a controlled and aggressive performance that led to a thoroughly deserved victory.
You can only play what is put in front of you and despite experiencing the early loss of Joyce Joyce and one of the longest TMO reviews ever, the team grew into the game with a number of players laying down markers for future challenges to come.
Gabriel Ibitoye was a live wire throughout, Callum Sheedy played like like a man who had left the weight on his shoulders back in the changing room and in Yann Thomas and particularly big Joe Batley, we had two gladiators who read the occasion perfectly by keeping the crowd whipped up to the edge of frenzy with full-on badge-kissing performances.
We may well come straight down to earth with the annual Enya trip to Sale away this weekend but just for now lets savour the moment and celebrate the fact that ‘we were there’ when Bristol out boks-ed the South Africans!
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