Lloyd leaves it late for Bristol to bring home the bacon

For the second Friday evening on the trot Bristol looked down the barrel of defeat but ultimately achieved their aim of retaining the Rifles Cup by coming from behind on a bitterly cold night at Kingsholm.

It was a staccato performance from the League leaders, who are now learning how to live with a target on their back, and at times the famed Bears’ system seemed somewhat off beat. If it hadn’t been for a try saving tackle from Luke Morahan with 20 minutes to go the fat lady would have been clearing her throat if not starting to sing. Luckily, she fluffed her lines.

The evening had started very well for both the Bears and first try punters when the Brynocerous scored after three minutes from a trademark catch and drive and it looked like the scene might be set for a standard forward led performance. But fairly quickly it became clear that Gloucester had no intention of being understudies in their own theatre and showed more ambition than their recent wretched run suggested, no doubt buoyed by the news earlier in the day that relegation had been scrapped. Some people unfairly describe the city as a large housing estate on the outskirts of Cheltenham, but they were relatively regent in the way that they tried to establish authority over their west country rivals after the opening try and credit to them for that.

For the neutral it was an entertaining first half with both sides trying to use the width of the pitch to hunt for space and the Cherry and Whites continued the Sharks’ bear hunting strategy from the previous week by employing a form of rapid rush defence that flirted with the offside line so outrageously that it made Bristol’s centre parings blush with embarrassment. But legal or otherwise it did the job and forced both Piers O’Conor and Siale Piatau into uncharacteristic errors as both literally tried to throw the game away by gifting a brace of tries to Santiago Carreras, Gloucester’s Argentinian international winger. He’s no opera singer but he clearly tuned into their intentions and snaffled the two interception passes with ease. For Bristol, it was perhaps less the result of cold hands and more a case of brain freeze as they tried to force the issue when merely patient build up phase play was required. However, the way that the offside line is refereed is really starting to irk as it seems that the officials only appear to penalise if there is one player sticking out whereas if the whole line is offside in unison then it gets ignored. I don’t ascribe any blame to any particular team because as we all know, rugby players push the rules to the limit until they get told otherwise, but it is a virus that infects attacking play and appears to have become endemic. I don’t understand why the touch judges can’t get more involved, particularly keeping an eye on the wider outside backs and make sure that behind the back foot of the ruck means what exactly it says. It’s not like it’s refereeing the breakdown. It’s a relatively simply thing to see. One line. Even so, Bristol could have been a bit cuter in countering the line speed with a few torpedos launched deep into Gloucester territory to turn them on their toes. Attacking from the opposition’s ten metre line rather than your own is clearly less risky and better strategic kicking surely has to be one of the main objectives on the weekly lesson plan. Despite the wholehearted way that Lloyd has stepped into his boots the team are perhaps missing the assurance of Callum Sheedy to conduct proceedings and get them back on the front foot when they are inevitably put under pressure.

Anyway, Bristol’s huff and puff finally realised its potential on 32 minutes with the sort of try patented as the ‘Bears’ way’ with a lineout steal on half way precipitating the whole showreel – a wraparound mis move in midfield, a pop to Lloyd on the loop supporting at pace, a rampaging run and offload from Nathan Hughes, quick ball from the ruck with Dave Attwood showing the centres how it’s done by driving through a slither of space in midfield and then popping the ball to Jake Heenan arriving on a positively delicious support line who crossed the whitewash with a filthy 20 metre run in. The fact that Willi Heinz made a total hash of tackling him was a further sauce of happiness for the Bristol faithful with the back rower leaving the scrum half playing ketchup in his slipstream. He will have bean very disappointed with his efforts.

The try spurred the Bears on, as they finally found a bit of attacking rhythm but then conceded a silly penalty when camped on the Gloucester line allowing them the chance to pack up and head for the half time sauna. That passage of play perfectly summed up Bristol’s somewhat erratic first half performance and although fans may have been forgiven for thinking that at times they had tuned into a donkey Derby there seems little doubt from the post-match interviews that Pat administered some Epsom salts to the swelling system errors with a few harsh words and searching questions at the break. Perhaps it wasn’t quite ‘get back on the coach’ time but was certainly ‘show me what you’ve got or else you’re walking home’ time. And given the plummeting temperature it seemed as good a way as any to galvanise the players into action.

If Bristol fans were expecting a less charitable second half from their charges they were soon disappointed as the Bears administered yet more gift aid to Gloucester by missing touch, conceding several penalties and then handing the initiative back by giving away a scrum free kick on their line from their own put in. Heinz was then instrumental in getting another try in the can with a quick tap and pass to Thorley who raced into the corner. At that point you felt that one or two players were already planning for the icy trudge home, but the system slowly started to sort itself out and despite narrowly avoiding a third interception try Ioan Lloyd kept his cool and slotted the final penalty leaving the Bears to play out the final four minutes. Even then they managed to somehow cough up possession with 5 seconds left on the clock but with Pat already instructing the coach driver to fire up the Bearmobile, the players made one last effort to grab possession back and the game was won.

Given the conditions it was an entertaining game for the neutrals but frustrating for both sets of fans for different reasons. Gloucester will take heart that they ran the Bristol close but when you look at the stats and consider the nature of the tries it would take a fairly myopic Sheddite to claim that anything other than a Bristol win was the right result.

Whereas Sale’s defence the previous week had been a solid grey suburban wall for the full 80, Gloucester’s was certainly more porous and that Piers O’Conor was top of the attack stats with 104 metres, 13 carries and 3 clean breaks suggests it took a bit of a battering. However, the big frustration for Bristol fans, as they reflect on the tale of the match, will be that despite a lot of line break sound and fury the majority of their possession signified nothing. Watching scintillating breaks fail to translate into scoreboard pressure is intensely frustrating and Bristol have been guilty of this more than most in recent times. 

That said, the playing conditions were challenging and as the oval bobbled around less like a hot potato and more like an icy snowball on the increasingly hard surface the players may have rightly wondered whether they had mistaken the pitch for the concrete car park. Apparently the game was close to being called off and it’s easy for us fans to criticise from the depth of our warmed-up cockles, so although the players are all professionals paid to do a job there has to be a certain amount of leeway given.

For the second week in a row Andy Uren came up against an experienced half back game manger with international caps and although he showed bursts of pace, power and purpose he needs to cement his run in the team by nailing the fundamentals of scrum half play more consistently through better decision making, more penetrative strategic kicking and quicker distribution. Now that Eddie Jones appears to have colluded with the other Premiership sides to keep Harry Randall away from League action by isolating him in some sort of glorified key worker Covid camp and showing scant intention of giving him a cap, Andy really has got to step up. But we have to back these up and coming Bristol bucks because they are what the Bears project are based on so I’m sure he’ll learn and go again.

Nathan Hughes approached the game with his standard alacrity before limping off early in the second half. He has had a fantastic start to the season but does basically have one gear and one MO which is to try and smash straight thought the tackler and at times you think a bit more finesse and change of pace could help him reach even higher performance levels.  Bristol have clearly missed Steve Luatua, scrum shepherder and problem solver in chief and it’s no coincidence that the rolling maul has been less effective in the last two games with his absence. Like the friendly uncle at a family gathering who pulls out a simple magic trick to keep the kids happy when things are starting to get fractious, the quicker he returns the better. 

On his first start the new Argentinian recruit Chapparo made acquaintance with Willi Heinz’s chest on a couple of occasions with some feisty counter rucking and although it was disappointing that he only lasted 20 minutes. He will certainly beef up a front row that already has an array of fine cuts, and in John Afoa, a 37-year dry aged steak whose continuing taste for the game appears to have no bounds. 

It is fantastic that Bristol remain top of the Premiership but ‘post-match Pat’ still had the look of a frustrated schoolteacher who can’t understand why his pupils seemed to have forgotten the basic lessons he had taught them. By its very nature, trying to blend individually skilled practitioners into a structured system to achieve total rugby on a consistent basis is no easy task and when you are looking to play on the edge there is always a danger that you might go over the edge. That happened against Sale but luckily the Bears were able to claw themselves back this time round . No doubt more homework assignments will have been set this week so let’s hope that when they are handed in they result in an A* performance against London Irish on Sunday.

Listen to the latest episode of Bears Beyond the Gate discussing this match and more, here.