Amidst a classic English rugby's greatest rivalries, the fixture involving Leicester and Bath proved to be heavily influenced by an emotion at half-time than any rugby on play.
Martin Johnson led a phalanx of Tigers old boys to pay tribute to Lewis Moody, who has announced that he has been diagnosed with motor neurone disease.
When Moody last pulled on the Tigers' jersey here, 15 years ago, prior to joining Bath for the last two years of a storied career, Leicester remained still at the peak of their powers, whereas their opponents found themselves in the middle of a long drought without the title. Times have changed since. Bath arrived as champions, the first time they've held that status since the 1990s.
An Emotional Reception on Home Turf
Leicester, riding a powerful emotional surge, served up a classic, robust reception, relishing their status as underdogs on their own pitch, the large home crowd greatly inspired by Moody’s confession at half-time that regardless of his residence, this famous ground remains his rugby home.
In retrospect, the visiting side were always up against it. True to form, in a last-minute assault on the Bath line, Leicester won a crucial penalty from the tiring Bath defenders.
The Climax
The replacement fly-half, who replaced the impressive James O’Connor, the seasoned Australian making his first start for Leicester, took a quick tap, and Thomas du Toit made a high tackle, for which offence he received a yellow card. From the final play, Searle landed the penalty from a difficult angle to steal the win.
It felt like being back in the days of Moody’s pomp. Without a doubt, Leicester, who moved up the table in the mid-table bun fight, can take great encouragement that a familiar frontal assault remains effective, no matter the pedigree of the opponent.
A Tale of Two Styles
Bath were sublime with ball in hand. So Leicester, following a confusing opening period which saw them trail 17-7, learned to deprive them of any. A succession of penalties conceded by Bath kept Bath on the back foot, their pack comprehensively bested in the scrums and lineouts throughout the game.
Leicester’s three tries were remarkably similar, all scored from close range; Bath’s three were studies in poetry. Frost, Underhill, and Redpath scored the tries, before and after Cracknell's score for Leicester. Subsequently, capitalizing on the penalty count, Reffell and Smith forced their way over to score just before and just after the break.
The Tense Finish
Those scores gave Leicester a narrow advantage, an advantage they maintained for the majority of the second period. It appeared inevitable before Bath won enough ball to score their fourth. In fact, their breakthrough came with a rare penalty at the scrum, their South Africans by then on. Finn Russell, after missing two earlier kicks, landed the kick inside the final ten minutes.
That only inspired Leicester for one last, brutish assault, initiated by the lively Ollie Hassell-Collins down the left. Having won the penalty that put Bath ahead in a situation he relishes, poor Du Toit gave away a penalty in a vulnerable position. The outcome was then a foregone conclusion.
