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Winger suffers 'nasty' injury as Bath count cost of win
By PA
Bath head coach Johann van Graan accepted that his side had blown a number of scoring chances after seeing his side triumph 20-15 over Leicester in an error-ridden game at Mattioli Woods Welford Road.
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Despite having the majority of territory and possession, Bath took their time to quell spirited opposition but failed to secure a bonus point.
Bath managed only three tries from Will Muir, Tom de Glanville and Guy Pepper. Finn Russell added one conversion with Ben Spencer kicking a penalty to avenge Tigers’ double over them last season.
Jack van Poortvliet and Dan Cole scored Leicester’s tries with Jamie Shillcock converting one and adding a penalty.
Van Graan said: “It’s a tough place to come and as expected they were very physical opposition so I’m happy with the four points as many sides will come here this season and not achieve that.
“We were prepared to go the full 80 minutes and looking at statistics we knew we needed a strong bench and so it proved as our replacements made a big difference to the outcome.
“It was a good win for us but we spurned loads of opportunities to score, especially in the first half when we were twice held up over the line and missed two penalties into touch.
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“We overcame the loss of both wings and both Joe (Cokanasiga) with a failed HIA and Will (Muir) with what looks a potential nasty knee injury will obviously miss the game with Bristol next week.”
Leicester’s newly-appointed head coach Michael Cheika saw his side produce a rearguard action to win their opening fixture at Exeter last week but despite a similar performance this week they were on the wrong end of the result.
He said: “Our goal-line defence was impressive as it carried on from last week so we put the foundations down in the first half to win.
“However in the second half we were looking at the scoreboard instead of getting after the game so there’s no point being happy with the first half if you don’t finish it off in the second.
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“We made a number of back to back errors which conceded field position and this helped them to dictate the tempo of the match in the second half
“I’ve enjoyed my experiences here so far but we had opportunities to win that game so I’m not happy today.”