'We’re all looking forward to being away from each other': Van Graan

Bath head coach Johann van Graan is giving his players a few days’ break in the coming week after confirming a Gallagher Prem play-off place with a 69-12 win over bottom club Newcastle.

They will then set their sights on a home semi-final in their bid to defend their crown.

England wing Henry Arundell crossed twice as Bath were unstoppable in racing to a 31-0 lead with five tries before half-time and Santiago Carreras was among those who got in on the act with six more following the break.

Van Graan said: “Tonight is about the five points that we got against Newcastle and that puts us in a semi-final again. It’s three seasons in a row that we’ve been in the top four.

“We’re all looking forward to being away from each other now for a few days, spend some time with our families and just get away from rugby. Some players will go to the England setup for a few days.

“We’ll have a pretty low training week. Then we’ll get cracking for the last two rounds and see where we end up.”

Van Graan insisted that their only goal had been to win the game against Newcastle and get a bonus point.

He said: “We didn’t even speak about points difference. We spoke about playing our game and not getting distracted and I thought all 23 players did that really, really well. The positive out of this game is we’re now in a semi-final.

“History has shown that it’s a lot easier to play at home than away from home, and I think the positive bit is that’s in our hands.”

The victory lifted Bath to 63 points, four points behind leaders Northampton and six points ahead of Leicester in third, who travel to Sale on Sunday. The scoreline against Newcastle lifted Bath’s points difference to 222, against the Tigers’ 47.

Newcastle found a brace of tries from Alex Hearle but there was no real crumb of comfort the Red Bulls could take from another heavy defeat.

Newcastle interim coach Stephen Jones said: “For patches, those 40 minutes in the middle part of the game, we showed some good effort and good fight. But in the last quarter we had a yellow card and the floodgates opened and the scoreline pulled away from us.

“But we had a lot of fight from our players. They gave us that. I’m over the moon with the way the boys stuck to their process. We’ve got some better ball movement, got some line breaks off the back of it. The challenge for us as a group is to make sure we stay on for that 80 minutes.

“I was happy with the fact we crossed the line on a couple of occasions. A few more we squandered, but it’s about us making sure that we stay in the fight.”