It was great to see the smiles return to Ashton Gate on Friday as Bristol beat old rivals Gloucester to win the Rifles Cup. A stark contrast to the bitter disappointment of the previous week’s European exit.
From my perspective, there was one clear element that defined the difference between the two games. That was the set piece. Our scrum was solid, lineouts were accurate and well-executed, and we were better at dealing with restarts.
Keeping possession, building sustained pressure and denying Gloucester attacking opportunities allowed us to play our way. By getting the basics right we looked a bit more like the table-topping team from last year.
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It was not all good news last week though as the injury plague that has hindered us all season returned with a vengeance.
Semi Radradra is out for the season following another knee op, Piutau and Sinckler are unavailable with ongoing niggles and Rich Lane’s impressive loan period brought to an end with a broken foot. It feels you’re more likely to see one of our stars in the BRI this season than BS3!
News also broke that we will lose Antoine Frisch to Munster next season. Although heavily rumoured, confirmation that he will be leaving after his year with the Bears is particularly disappointing.
At the end of last season there seemed to be two areas we really needed to get in quality cover - tight-head prop and inside centre. In Frisch perhaps we had found someone who could really develop into a top-quality centre and I’m gutted we won’t see his development in a Bears shirt. With Pat stating he’s done his recruitment early again for next season, this only leaves Sam Bedlow as the one real, experienced inside centre in the squad.
And as for tight-head, John Afoa’s 69-minute performance against Gloucester shows how important this specialist position is to the team.
Afoa is without doubt the best scrummager we have at the club and his knowledge of the ‘dark arts’ from a career in the front row will be sorely missed when he retires at the end of the season.
With only Rhys Charalambous arriving from university rugby do we really have the necessary cover to cope with Sinckler’s international absences? Maybe one more year John!
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