We may be heading out of the wettest, coldest months of the year, but Bristol Bears are in desperate need of learning of the craft of playing in the rain.
The Bears have thrilled and delighted with their high-octane, high-skill, high-risk style of rugby this season that has seen them climb to second in the Gallagher Premiership table, but ultimately their inability to turn to a Plan B risks derailing their season.
In the pouring rain on Friday night, with mud-stained white jerseys everywhere you looked by the final whistle, the Bears were out-thought, out-muscled and out-thought tactically by a wily Bedford side who are sitting second in the Championship.
While Pat Lam sent a young side to Goldington Road, their inability to strip back the game plan and change track from repeatedly unsuccessfully running from deep in the heavy conditions was deeply worrying. Even the sparkling feet of Fijian star Kalaveti Ravouvou couldn’t find a gap in the Blues’ well orgnaised defensive line on the heavy pitch.
Speaking after the match, Lam said: “The conditions were tricky for us. We had many opportunities to score, particularly in the first 20 minutes, I think we had three or for chances to score but we didn’t take any of them. The game then became a bit of a slog with penalties and turnovers against us and the game just got away from us and it was always going to be difficult from then on.
“We didn’t use the wind very well. Once you fall behind on that scoreboard you have got to play good, disciplined, accurate rugby and we didn’t do that and paid the price.
“We have played at this ground before and when it is wet and windy it is even more tricky but we didn’t play the conditions well enough.”
While the Bears started the game with on-loan Hartpury fly-half Harry Bazalgette and third-choice scrum half Sam Wolstenholme at half-back, they brought on former Irish international Kieran Marmion, but even the former Connacht man – who has plenty of experience playing in horrible weather conditions – couldn’t turn the tide of the momentum in defeat at Bedford.
The Bears’ lack of top end size and muscle in their pack, which is full of talented athletes, is a growing concern when it comes to going head-to-head with the big boys. Okay, there were very few starters from Bristol’s ‘best team’ in the side that ran out in the Premiership Rugby Cup – but in the Champions Cup earlier this season Bristol struggled to stay in the arm wrestle against the big packs of La Rochelle, Leinster and Clermont. Again there are caveats, with the French and Irish side boasting far bigger budgets in terms of building their squad.
But the fear is, heading into the run in the Premiership, is Lam is leaving a lot down to the fate of the weather gods as to whether his side can bring home a first league title of the professional era, and that should leave him sleeping uneasy in his bed. No one wants to watch this Bears side go back to playing the poor, more data driven rugby of the first half of last season, but having the ability to switch lanes when the scenario calls for it could take the club to another level.
With Bristol now unlikely to be involved in the knockout stages of the Premiership Rugby Cup Lam could have five weeks without a fixture to work on it.