Pat Lam has come back to pre-season seemingly with a new mindset which bodes well for Bristol Bears heading into 2023/24.
The Bristol director of rugby finished last campaign defensively reminding fans how far the club has come under his tenure having come under increasingly hostile fire, because despite plenty of achievements to hang his hat on, the last two seasons have seen a decline in results with a frustrating ninth-place finish last term deemed not good enough. Having inspired Bristol fans to dream big, with talk of delivering more trophies at the Bears to add to the Challenge Cup title he won in 2020, the simple truth is last two seasons have been underwhelming.
But Lam is intent on using this prolonged pre-season to reset the course of the club. Speaking in his first interview on the Bears website since the players checked back in for training on June 19, Lam said: “It is very exciting to be back, there is a real buzz.
“It is a fresh start but it is also a continuation of our journey. It is important that what we have done over the last six seasons, there is a lot of growth and learnings there. There are a lot of things we have done really well and a lot of things we can do a lot better and that gives us the ammunition to take it to the next level. It has been challenging and enjoyable so far.
“The most important priority for us now is using these 16 weeks of pre-season to give us the best possible advantage so we can come back and show our supporters who have been questioning us, and rightly so because they want improvement, because we have set high standards and we want those high standards.”
There will be no more hiding away from the expectations he set. Lam is embracing them and confronting them despite heading into next season with a potentially weaker squad having seen marquee players Semi Radradra and Charles Piutau move on this summer due to the salary cap squeeze, along with a host of other notable players like Joe Joyce and Sam Jeffries.
The recent arrival of former London Irish powerhouse centre Benhard Janse van Rensburg has eased the blow of some of the departures, while Max Malins and Kalaveti Ravouvou will add some stardust after they have completed their new World Cup commitments. And the club’s new arrivals who have already checked into the High Performance Centre are making a positive impression in training Lam revealed.
He said: “You can see already, like any of us when we move to a new club, they want to prove themselves. Certainly Sam Wolstenholme and Kieran Marmion, two nines have come in and they both did really well in the Broncos.
“BV [Benhard Janse van Rensburg] has come in and off the back of a couple of great seasons at London Irish and you can see his quality as well.
“All of these players will come in and have something to prove.
“We have got Josh Caulfield coming in as well, a local guy from Weston who did well at London Irish as well and is hungry to do well for his hometown.”
As for the team and his organisation as a whole Lam has identified the two key areas they must improve in to get back into the conversation of being title contenders alongside the likes of champions Saracens, beaten finalists Sale Sharks and Leicester Tigers.
He explained: “The two main things we are focusing on is to improve our discipline as a whole organisation. For the first three seasons in the Premiership we were one of the most disciplined teams, the last two we have been down near the bottom of that and we have really got to improve that; everyone in the organisation, everyone, the staff the players, everyone in everything we do."
One man who has been a victim Lam's identification of of Bristol's discipline issues over the last couple of years is openside flanker Dan Thomas. Fans have scratched their head as the Welshman has repeatedly been left out of squads but the backrower statistically gives away more penalties per minute on the pitch in open play than anyone else in the squad.
Lam continued: “The other one is just to grow a real toughness. That is not just the physical side but under any distress or discomfort to be able to make really clear decisions.
“We all know sometimes the first action is not the best one, or we say the wrong thing, it is about being able to make good choices at the right time.
“Everything is geared around that. A simple example is normally you run the Bronco test and you just zone out and go as hard as you can, but this year as soon as that was done the players had to go straight into a skill component so they had to quickly think and operate under a bit of pressure and discomfort. That was interesting.
“If we stopped after the Bronco we would have probably applauded a few boys for the way they ran but some of those boys then weren’t able to do the skills as well. We are giving them that sort of opportunity right through the pre-season so hopefully by the time we get to games our decision-making and discipline will be improved.”
The proof of course will come in September, when the Bears kick off their 2023/24 season with a pre-season game against Exeter Chiefs on September 1 followed by a blockbuster exhibition game against the Barbarians on September 7 before the revamped Premiership Rugby Cup kicks off the following weekend.
