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Falcons v Bath 21/10/07

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By Leipziger
October 18 2007
For those of you who will get mullered during and after England retain the World Cup on Saturday night, please don’t forget that there is another rugby match this weekend that might interest you, on Sunday when the mighty Newcastle Falcons take on Bath.

So, after we watch Jonny, Spud and Noah lift the Webb Ellis Trophy in Paris it’s back to Premiership action at Kingston Park as we look to continue our 100% home start to the season, and let’s face it with our away form we need too.

 

However, as the home form gets progressively worse, we can’t take anything for granted against the only side to come away from the North East with four points this year.

 

Bath have five players in the England squad at present, with Matt Stevens the only one even on the bench on Saturday having lost his starting place to the returning captain Phil Vickery, whilst Steve Borthwick has lost out on a substitute place since the group stage.

 

Olly Barkley formed a winning partnership with Jonny Wilkinson in the last two group games but injury forced him out of the team, and Lee Mears has had little action in France.  Nick Abendanon was a late call-up this week for the injured Josh Lewsey, which seemed a little pointless, but there we are.

 

One international they do have though is Springbok scrum-half Michael Claasens, who will no doubt give Lee Dickson a decent test, and former England and Falcons flyer Michael Stephenson is expected to play at full-back.

 

Bath have lost only once so far in 2007/08, at Leicester on the second weekend of the season, and they defeated London Irish at the Madejski (where we were routed don’t forget) two weeks ago by a slender 20-22 thanks to Danny Grewcock’s late try.

 

Last week the West Country side completed a hat-trick of home wins by defeating Harlequins 25-10, Stephenson amongst three try-scorers.  This run of results has led to Bath climbing up to third place in the Premiership, two places and three points above ourselves and behind only Gloucester and Saracens.

 

Tim Visser will make his first start of the season for the Falcons in the inside centre role on Sunday, replacing Adam Dehaty, and the Falcons forwards, featuring Jon Golding, Andy Perry and the returning Micky Ward will have to be at their best if they are to win enough possession for Steve Jones to exploit his pace.

 

Last week’s captain Joe McDonnell drops to the bench alongside four other forwards, with last week’s sole points-scorer Matthew Burke leading the side.

 

15 Matthew Burke (captain)
14 Tom May
13 Tim Visser
12 Joe Shaw
11 John Rudd
10 Steve Jones
9 Lee Dickson
1 Jon Golding
2 Matt Thompson
3 Micky Ward
4 Andy Perry
5 Mark Sorenson
6 Geoff Parling
7 Brent Wilson
8 Russell Winter

Replacements:
16 Andy Long
17 Joe McDonnell
18 David Wilson
19 Jason Oakes
20 Eni Gesinde
21 James Grindal
22 Adam Dehaty

 

As Bath have not named their team officially yet, this is what the Bath Chronicle seem to expect, with Michael Stephenson and David Barnes potentially returning to KP again:

 Bath team: (probable): 15 Michael Stephenson, 14 Tom Cheeseman, 13 Alex Crockett (capt), 12 Shaun Berne, 11 Ian Davey, 10 Ryan Davis, 9 Michael Claassens, 1 David Flatman, 2 Pieter Dixon, 3 Paulica Ion, 4 Peter Short, 5 Danny Grewcock, 6 Andy Beattie, 7 Michael Lipman, 8 Daniel Browne.
Replacements (from): Lawrence Ovens, David Barnes, Rob Hawkins, Jonny Faamatuainu, James Scaysbrook, Zak Feaunati, Nick Walshe, Matt Banahan, Andrew Higgins I wasn’t going to mention that this game is on Sky, but that’s beside the point – it’s a Sunday afternoon game (and that’s what the overwhelming majority wanted, isn’t it?), England will have won the World Cup the previous night and will leave you aching for live rugby, and as any regular will tell you, watching on TV just ain’t the same. 

Get yourselves down to KP and support the team, they’ll need it in their toughest home match of the season so far.

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