Bath vs Wasps match report: Elliot Daly inspires Wasps to press England claims

Bath 10 Wasps 36

Elliot Daly pulls away from Dave Attwood’s attempted tackle to score for Wasps (Getty Images)

Christmas at the Ricoh Arena will be a merry affair indeed. Wasps, driven on by 23 points from Jimmy Gopperth, regained control of pool five in the Champions’ Cup after their home hiccup against Bath a week earlier and now number their English rivals, as well as Toulon and Leinster, among their notable victims this season.

It is too early to judge the outcome of the pool because of the postponed game between Bath and Toulon but Wasps are at least masters of their own destiny. Masters here, too, through Gopperth’s control, the strength of their scrum in the first half and their ability to slow Bath at the breakdown to ensure that, even on a muddy pitch, the hosts brought no game-breakers to the party.

The previous week Bath had snatched the verdict deep into injury-time; at the same stage here they were reduced to 14 men and had nowhere to hide.

They threatened to rally midway through the second half but there was no substance to their game; only during the third quarter did their scrum operate to any great effect, 36 minutes had passed before they won so much as a penalty and, by the end, the early try scored by Semesa Rokoduguni, who had received a yellow card for a deliberate knock-down, seemed almost an aberration.

“I’ll probably sit down with the coaches and management and review everything we have done [this season],” Mike Ford, Bath’s director of rugby, said.

“So will the players. I haven’t given up on getting out of our pool but our belief is a bit fragile at the moment. Perhaps there was a bit of leadership lacking.”

It did not help that Bath’s gamble in playing Francois Louw, despite his groin strain, did not pay off. They already had a raft of injuries among the back-five forwards and Louw, the captain, went off midway through the first half during a 10-minute period during which Wasps scored 13 points.

Kyle Eastmond worked Rokoduguni clear with only 10 minutes played, though the officials checked several times whether the centre’s pass was forward. But Wasps bounced back when David Denton handed a poor pass in Anthony Watson’s direction, Joe Simpson snaffled the ball and Elliot Daly, who made a mesmeric run in the opening moments of the match, had far too much pace for the defence.

Daly, playing in front of the watching England coach, Eddie Jones, is a certainty for the national squad in the mind of David Young, the Wasps director of rugby.

“We know he can do the flashy stuff,” Young said, “but he’s doing the simple things well. He was fantastic in defence, kicked well out of hand, realises he has to do the bread-and-butter things.”

If, of course, you need bread and butter, you call for a Kiwi and Gopperth answered the call. Young was unhappy with how his side played for field position in the first pool game between the clubs and Gopperth pushed and pulled Bath all over the place.

An early penalty was followed by two more to extend Wasps’ advantage and then a superb try. A fifty-metre penalty took Wasps to the Bath 22, two scrums gave Nathan Hughes a sniff of the line but he was held up. No matter, Hughes broke blind from the second scrum and Gopperth, not the biggest of men, muscled his way over past George Ford and Rokoduguni, his touchline conversion giving Wasps a 16-point lead at the interval.

Wasps might have nailed matters just after half-time but Bath’s defence denied them and the home scrum forced a penalty that Ford converted. But Bath could not match the industry and understanding of the visiting back row in which James Haskell was outstanding.

Gopperth kicked his fourth penalty, Daly dropped a lowslung and, with six minutes remaining, Bath’s faint hopes of a bonus point disappeared. Behind a line-out 20 metres out, Gopperth darted through a despairing defence and found Alapati Leuia at his elbow and the centre ran in unmolested to touch down under the posts.

“You couldn’t have wished for much better,” Young said “The mince pieces will taste all the sweeter.”

Teams

Bath: A Watson; S Rokoduguni (sin bin 72), J Joseph, K Eastmond (R Priestland, 41), M Banahan (T Homer, 69); G Ford, N Matawalu (C Cook, 51); N Auterac (M Lahiff, 46), R Batty (R Webber, 48-74), D Wilson (H Thomas, 46), M Garvey, D Attwood, L Houston, F Louw (captain; G Mercer, 20), D Denton (C Ewels, 71).

Wasps: R Miller; F Halai, E Daly (R Jackson, 76), B Jacobs (A Leuia, 61), C Piutau (D Robson, 76); J Gopperth, J Simpson; M Mullan (S McIntyre, 61), A Johnson (E Shervington, 54), L Cittadini (P Swainston, 66), J Launchbury, B Davies (J Gaskell, 61), J Haskell (captain), G Smith, N Hughes (S Jones, 67).

Referee: R Poite (France)