The 2015/16 Aviva Premiership season is undoubtably going to be one of the most challenging and arduous for our Aviva Premiership sides. With the presence of a home Rugby World Cup there isn’t any room for the annual LV Cup and with European duties as well rest weekends are few and far between.
When the competition commences for some clubs the first challenge will be managing without many key individuals for the opening rounds and a side that will be losing more than most are Bath Rugby. In total Bath have over ten players out on International duty and it has meant that Head Coach Mike Ford has needed to address a number of elements during the pre-season not just his players’ conditioning. Developing a solid leadership group is integral to any domestic or international rugby side and most of the leaders that directed Bath Rugby to the Aviva Premiership Final are now away on International duty. There are few individuals for which leadership comes truly naturally therefore developing key players in that area has been, and remains, a focus for the summer;
“It isn’t a case of right you are a leader now go and talk to the players… they are learning what to, what needs to be said, how you say it and all of the different elements. Over the last four or five weeks we have had some fantastic growth in these players as leaders and when the other leaders come back we will have two leadership groups because it is important to keep developing and growing the players underneath.”
Heading into their four West Country Challenge Cup matches Mike was very open regarding the numbers that they have available to them this pre-season - fewer than other clubs. Exeter will be putting out a different XV in each half for their pre-season matches however Bath are a long way from having that luxury! This isn’t necessarily going to be a hinderance to the club instead it is going to give individuals ample opportunity to put their hands up for selection with specific goals outlined for each fixture;
“We have developed the less experienced end of the playing squad in terms of the time with the coaches, a lot of one on ones and they’ve been doing a lot more game time in training so they have got more reps in them. You’ll see a side against Gloucester on Sunday is very, very young but the summer is allowing us to make the depth in the squad stronger.”
“As a club, as coaches and as a group of senior player we all sit down each week and outline the critical outcome that we want to achieve from a game. We did hat this morning and what we want to try and get out of the game this weekend and hasn't got anything to do with the result, put it that way. If we achieve what we want to achieve and this critical outcome then we will be in a good place to go into the week after when we play Exeter away and that is all we want to do, is to get better every day, every week and every game. We want to get better and the bigger picture is that come 17th October we are ready to play in the Premiership with a tough start.”
This weekend’s fixture will be played at the Memorial Stadium in Bristol as Kingsholm will be gearing up to host a series of Rugby World Cup fixtures. As with any domestic team that are losing a number of individuals to International duty, these pre-season fixtures and the start of the Aviva Premiership season will challenge Bath Rugby however at Farleigh House the mood is high. Yesterday it was announced that all four coaches have just signed new four year deals and all, in Mike Ford's words, are 'hungrier than ever' for this season after the denouement to last. The Bath blueprint will not be changing, attacking rugby is the order of the day and it starts this weekend against their old rivals Gloucester Rugby.
Gloucester Rugby and Bath Rugby will announce the teams for their West Country Challenge Cup Derby on Friday 11th September at 12pm. KO Sunday 13th September at 3pm, Memorial Stadium in Bristol.
