Everyone in the crowd was watching Catt, the Bath supporters, in the most, wanted to see their old-boy play well (but not too well), we wanted his fairytale to come true and have him be the instrument of Bath's downfall. Sadly it didn't quite come off.

The game started brightly, most of the pressure coming from Bath but with Irish holding the lively home-side back. Catt's initial input was tentative and perhaps gave a hint of the turmoil Mike was experiencing. A long kick here a wayard pass there, nothing horrible but nothing great either. The rest of the play went along the lines of Bath making concerted in-roads into the Irish defence only to be repelled. When Irish got the ball they showed much ambition to use our backs to stretch the Bath defensive line. The attempts worked well initially until we'd hit the Bath 22 at which point the home team would start to repel our attacks with ease. It was partly excellent to see our attacking line having the patience to try again and again to break the gain-line but it was increasingly obvious that it wasn't going to happen and a new tack should be taken. Sadly, this was never actioned and stale attack after stale attack was thwarted. Many of them on the Bath left flank by a turn-over which was then either run or kicked and chased to force Irish into panic defence to prevent a heart-breaking try. Luckily we managed to keep them out, just.

This pattern of play continued for a quarter of an hour with Bath certainly looking the livliest of the two teams but, even with their breaks scaring the Irish supporters, not really looking like scoring. At this point Irish's problem really started, Michael Horak needed to go off, I didn't see any particular incident but he appeared to have tweaked a hamstring and hobbled off to be replaced by Nils Mordt. Nils is obviously a centre which meant Tofty dropped to full-back. As if this didn't cause enough problems the Irish scrum, which had never looked particularly happy started to creak. Eventually we were penalised mid-field about 5 metres inside our half for failing to bind. Step up Olly Barkley, 3 points to Bath.

As an interesting aside, I watched the Leicester v Bath game on the telly a few weeks ago and was amazed that the Bath tighthead Duncan Bell stayed on the pitch. He consistently failed to bind and was outplayed in every scrum by the Tigers. It was interesting to find that we were now being pinged for front-row infringements which, from a distance could have been equally Bath's fault. I obviously defer to the ref on the scene but the memory of the Tigers game popped into my head while I was thinking about our troubles up-front. We were missing Beefy and so I suspect the ref was spot-on, with Doug having played tighthead a lot recenlty I suspect he was simply a bit ring-rusty.

Irish's problems now continued, almost from the restart Bath hoisted a beautifully placed high kick to Tofty. Mark had just switched to full-back so it was excellent timing, the kick also seemed to be heading for the space just in front of our 22 but then drifted backwards to just inside. Bath chased manfully and so Tofty had to decide if he could mark it, work out where to off-load if he couldn't and keep an eye on the approaching blue and black tide. I do hope he also wasn't still pondering the epic quiz question from Wednesday which so pained him, whatever the cause the catch was dropped leaving our new full-bakc on his knees facing the wrong way as Barkley streamed past him and kicked the ball under our posts to score an easy try. He then went on to convert it 10 - 0.

Irish didn't give up (a universal truth throughout the match) and fired back an attack of their own whih ended in a penalty just inside the Bath half out left. This was kicked to touch by Catt, it was perhaps a little long for a kick at goal. The subsequent lineout was won by Irish and a maul formed which was torn apart by Bath, we managed to get the ball back and spun it wide but the attack was halted. Fortunately Mr Rose had spotted Bath encroaching the off-side line and the simple penalty in front of the posts was duly slotted by Tofty 10 - 3.

Bath, however, weren't in the mood to let Irish chip their way back into the game. Another set of phases pushed Irish back, eventually giving Bath an attacking lineout. This became a lesson in simple rugby. The ball came easily off the top to the scrum-half and passed through a second set of hands, drawing the defence aside, to Zak Feaunati who strolled in through a huge gap to score under the posts. Again, Barkley converted. 17 - 3.

Back again we went to the Irish attack move (there seemed to be only one we were willing to use). Again Bath held us on their 22 until we made the mistake and they got their chance to run it back at us. Play then went to the midfield with both sides turning ball over to the other. Barkley missed a penalty from about the centre-spot for Irish failin to release, possibly his only mistake of the day.

From the restart Bath launched a savage attack, spinning the ball wide left with terrifying speed, far too fast for our defence which let Bath outside-centre Alex Crockett touch down just inside the left touchline. A difficult conversion for Barkley which he made look very easy 24 - 3.

It was getting close to half-time and looking truly awful for Irish, Bath continued their pressure and again spun the ball out left only to have Justin Bishop intercept the final pass an run 2/3rds of the pitch to score a try. Tofty pulled the conversion left and the half-time whistle blew with Bath leading 24 - 8.

It was quite obvious at this point that if Irish didn't start playing to their ability this lively Bath team would continue to tear us apart. Every Irish supporter around me acknowledged the fact that we had pretty much already lost, what was really worrying us was the extent of the loss.

Second half started with play scrappily changing hands, Gary Gold had seen enough and started ringing the changes. Spud came off to be replaced by Rolad Reid with David Paice being taken off for the recently flown-in Robbie Russell. Robbie had only played a few minutes of the Scotland loss to South Africa and so was able to play for us too.

The new chaps didn't immediately affect play, neither did Lee Mears who replaced Bath stalwart Jonathan Humphreys. Play continued with both sides making attacking moves and being held by solid defence. It was now clear that half-time had at least made Irish aware of their first-half defensive frailties, the lads were looking much more like the thin green line of old. The attacks, however, were still a little one-dimensional although Staniforth made a few half-breaks including, at last, a box-kick over the Bath defence. It didn't come-off but it made Bath look uncomfortable for perhaps the first time in the day. During this time Tofty missed a very long kick from the centre of the field.

The home-side didn't give up with their bright attacking play, although they were now being limited slightly to more breaks from our attacks than their own well-crafted moves. One such breakaway ended in a tackle which, from the reaction of the crowd on that side of the field was either very high or involved a swinging arm. The Bath player wasn't hurt, I couldn't see anything clearly from my position, Mr Rose hat a quick chat with Captain Bob (and no-one else, so I suspect Bob was the culprit) and gave a penalty to Bath. The crowd at that part of the ground then consistently chanted "off, off" every time a lineout was formed down that end, I don't think they were too happy. Barkley kicked the penalty and gave Bath their final points of the game 27 - 8. I have to admit I thought they would have been better at this point going for the try bonus but there was plently of time.

Gary Gold then made an inspired change, Barry Everitt coming on for Tofty and Darren Edwards on for Dodge. The second change here seemed wrong as Paul had been his usual busy self and was keeping Irish attaacks going with his quick pass from the breakdown but Darren proved to be his equal playing as well as I've seen him in his 20 or so minutes. Catty now became our third full-back of the day with Barry taking on the fly-half duties. From this moment on the ship was steadied, Barry's positional kicking, especially in defence gave us so much more space. The worries weren't over but Bath were forced to switch to using forwards to attack, they also changed their defence to punt everything back to Catt instead of their previously effective running game.

A further change brought Ryan on for Nick Kennedy, who had not been as dominant in the lineout as he has in previous games. Bath's lineout was solid all day, I shudder to think what it would have been like with Borthwick and Grewcock in it too...

Bath now turned the screw, trying to maul their way to a bonus point. They camped for what seemed like about 18 months on the Irish try-line. Irish infringed once, boring into a 5 metre scrum which was the result of a maul being held-up and defended massively. Again, and again Bath tried to cross the whitewash only to have an error forced by massive hits from the Irish. Barry was instrumental in relieving the pressure by hitting very long kicks to touch once we had the ball.

Buoyed by their new found control Irish started to attack again, there were some excellent displays of handling from our backs, one particular hand-off and off-load combination was superb (I think it was Geoff, but don't quote me) but the old malaise was creeping back, either the last pass was way to early or the recipient simply dropped the pill.

While the backs were starting to get their game together the forwards were still having a torrid time in the tight, The scrum still wasn't providing an attacking opportunity and we were pulled for boring in at least once. Adam Halsey was brought on to give Doug Wheately a good rest.

The Bath Backs, now with Martin Wood at scrum half for Walshe, started to try again. An ominous break down the right flank was stopped only by some desparate Irish tackles, new boy Robin Reid was deemed to have handled in the ruck and was sin-binned for his efforts to slow the ball down. The kick was pushed to our corner again and, from the lineout Bath, again, attempted to maul over the line. Irish defended mightily forcing Bath to try their backs again. Bath were now, however playing from our play book and conspired to drop the final ball rather than score a try.

They did, though, desperately want that try and camped again on the Irish try line frantically trying their luck. The green line held and eventually theclearance came from Barry. The Irish were now keen to relieve the pressure and began to force Bath backwards and into their own half and eventually their 22. A clearance kick was gathered by Catt and Irish tried to emulate their opponents first half attacks. A lovley series of off-loads from tackles by just about the entire back-line released Staniforth who charged to the try line only to be stopped just short. Sadly his attempts to recycle the ball only resulted in a knock-on.

Irish kept the pressure up however and tried to spin the ball along the Bath defensive line looking for a gap. A few miss-passes later the ball arrived at right wing Ryan Strudwick (Rob Hardwick was having a breather I expect) who hopped over the line for a well-deserved score. Barry, knowing the time was virtually up, dropped the conversion successfully but full-time was called Bath 27 - 15 London Irish.

Much of the post-match analysis from Irish supporters was negative, most felt we had played very badly. I heartily disagree, we were not as good as we have been recently, but even our victories recently haven't been 100% convincing (Auch excepted) and while this was a partial step-back I think we have to look at the reasons for the drop in form. Bath were superb, especially in the first half. The came at us relentlessly in the first half and their domination of the scoreboard was richly deserved. Undisputed Man of the Match Olly Barkley was awesome, he certainly won the new vs old battle against Catt. Mike will simply be glad to have got this traumatic game out of the way. He wasn't terrible, far from it but the young Bath fly-half showed a lot more flair than either Catt or Everitt when it came down to it.

I do think we were very one-dimensional in attack, when Bath's defence was coming up fast and flat a box-kick over it or grubber through it could have caused a lot more problems than simply slinging the ball along a solid line. I was very happy with the spirit we showed in the second half, the whole team can be be proud that Bath didn't win the BP. Had Stan's run late on produced a try (and it was very close) then we would have had a BP of our own (which we certainly didn't deserve).

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