Western Daily Press (Saturday)
Refreshed Bath have feet on the ground – Johann
JOHANN van Graan insists that his Bath Rugby players have their feet “firmly on the ground” despite them leading the way in the Gallagher Premiership going into round ten of the campaign.
Bath’s 25-17 home victory over Harlequins last weekend sent the Blue, Black & Whites to the top of the league standings ahead of the trip to old rivals Leicester tomorrow.
Head of rugby Van Graan told the official Bath Rugby website: “We’ve had a good Christmas. Players, staff, coaches all went away for three days. It was valuable time spent with our families and we were a refreshed group coming in on Wednesday.
“It’s a strange week because we now play on a Sunday, but we’re looking forward to a big old rivalry.
“We’ve had some close ones in the last 18 months against Leicester – two one-point games and we had a tough one back in March at Welford Road, but in terms of the Premiership, it’s a great game to look forward to.”
The Blue, Black & Whites lost the reverse fixture 25-24 at the Rec back in October, and Van Graan added: “We stick with our theme of starting each week on zero. That was a wet game. It got decided by very small margins and that feels like ages ago.
“Leicester are a team that we respect. They have some of the best players on the planet in their team and two seasons ago they were the (Premiership) champions.
“They’re very tough to beat and they play a very specific way. We’ve reviewed the game against Quins, taken out of it what we could and prepared accordingly, so we haven’t given the game at the Rec (against Leicester) a whole host of focus.
“They are also a totally different team in terms personnel, so our focus, like every week, has been on ourselves and we’ll give them the respect they deserve and they deserve a lot.
“From a top of the table point of view, it’s nice to be top going into
Christmas, but we as a group just want to get better week on week.
“There’s such a long way to go for us, being top at Christmas was only a small goal we set ourselves last week, but in the grand scheme of things we’ve achieved nothing yet. We’ve certainly got better as a group, but we’ve got a long way to go and our feet are firmly on the ground.”
Hame Faiva makes his first Bath start at hooker, while half-backs Ben Spencer and Finn Russell are both left out by Van Graan.