Despite a couple of injury concerns within the squad, Bath Rugby head coach Johann van Graan was upbeat in yesterday’s press conference ahead of Friday’s Premiership opener against reigning champions Northampton Saints.
Bath head into the new season as one of the favourites for the title after an impressive 2023/24 season, in which they reached the final at Twickenham before losing narrowly to their upcoming opponents. Stating that every team will improve this season, Van Graan said simply that his side will have to “improve faster” than the others if they are to come away with silverware this term.
The west-country side has been busy this summer renewing the contracts of many of their players and signing numerous high-quality talents, including the highly promising Guy Pepper from Newcastle Falcons and the impressive Ross Molony from Leinster.
Despite the impressive number of players recommitting to the club, several forwards have exited the squad ahead of the coming season including locks Josh McNally and Elliot Stooke, leaving a couple of giant holes in the middle of the pack.
Besides the obvious loss of Matt Gallagher to Benetton, the backline remains as impressive as ever. Injuries sustained during pre-season have, however, caused Van Graan to assess the depth in midfield ahead of the opening match, with centres Max Ojomoh and Cameron Redpath not available for the opener.
The greatly improved Max Ojomoh has recently found himself out of action following a nasty foot injury and, according to his boss, he won’t be returning to the side anytime soon.
“Max Ojomoh will be out for a number of weeks with that foot”, Van Graan said.
“I’m not going to put a timeline on it but it was not good news from the specialist, so Max will be out for a number of weeks.”
Discussing the competition at 12, Van Graan continued: “Orlando did really, really well at 12 this preseason. Louis Hennessey has had a fantastic under-20s World Cup and Ollie (Lawrence) is one of the best players in the Premiership, so we’ve got good depth there. Cam Redpath is still a couple of weeks away from returning from that surgery, but the positive thing about Cam is that he did most parts of training today so he’s not far off.
“The sad thing for Max is that he was one of our best players in our pre-season, but he’s pragmatic about it. He’s been injury-free for the past three seasons so he will get through this.”
There may be some light reshuffling needed in the backline, but in terms of the forward pack, there’s plenty of competition for starting places. New signing Guy Pepper has been one of the most exciting Premiership signings of the summer, with the new man expected to push on and become a real world-class player this year, but the Bath coach says he’ll have to “fight” for his place first.
“Guy Pepper, I see some real talent in. He’s got a fight on his hands in that loose forward department to get into the team, but he’s a breakdown specialist and he’s got an engine, something you can’t coach.”
Bath Rugby will welcome Northampton Saints to the Recreation Ground on Friday 20th September at 19:45 UK time.
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