It was of absolutely no consolation to Bath that the River Avon looked a picture in the sunshine this afternoon. This was a day for ignoring all distractions and winning ugly but when the moment came they were neither sharp nor smart enough to seize it. Having sunk from European view with barely a ripple last season there is already a creeping sense of deja vu at the Rec.
Victory in Belfast or the Basque country will probably be required if Bath are to make it out of Pool Four. The realisation is also dawning that, for all their pre-season optimism, Bath are struggling to finish off sides who do not faint at the first sight of an offload. Northampton, Gloucester and now Biarritz have delivered blows to the collective solar plexus and Bath's campaign is starting to wobble.
That may sound a trifle alarmist, based on a defeat by a point to opponents who reached the Heineken Cup final last May, but this is not a tournament which offers many second chances. Steve Meehan, the Bath head coach, could not hide his frustration, particularly with a second-half performance that was not notable for its tactical acumen.
"We've got to grow up," he said, referring to his team's failure to take a drop goal when Biarritz were pinned on their own line. "We should have been ruthless and put it through the sticks."
The England prop David Wilson failed to endear himself to the management, getting himself sent to the sin-bin with 10 minutes left, for knocking the ball out of Dimitri Yachvili's hands. Wilson, who was being watched by the national scrummaging coach, Graham Rowntree, was also shown a yellow card at a crucial stage against Northampton last month. Meehan did not mince his words: "We've got to be more disciplined … we're giving away too many yellow cards already this season. Davy apologised immediately but every action in every game is important. Avoid the action and you can forget the apology."
It was all reminiscent of Bath's last-gasp home defeat by Stade Français last season, the only difference being that Biarritz barely had to attack. They could have had Paddington Bear at inside-centre rather than Michael Bond, their new Australian recruit, and it would not greatly have affected the stately tempo of their game. With a big front five, Imanol Harinordoquy picking off ball at lineouts and restarts and Yachvili playing the percentages, Biarritz tend not to blast sides apart. But they take some breaking down away from home.
It seemed at first as though Bath might have the wit to unpick the padlock. Biarritz received a hammering in the penalty count and Olly Barkley slotted an early penalty before producing a delectable flick pass to Nick Abendanon which prefaced Michael Claassens' seventh‑minute try. It was to prove a temporary high, however, as Barkley missed three of his first four shots at goal and the crowd fell as quiet as hibernating field mice.
Had Yachvili been playing for Bath, the outcome would never have been in doubt. Not only does the France scrum-half knock over his penalty kicks with the sweetest of boots but he also seizes on opposition uncertainty more consistently than anyone in Europe. In his time he has kicked England to distraction and here, slowly but surely, he dragged Biarritz back into the ascendancy. It helped that Bath gave away silly penalties for lineout obstruction and failed to hold on to the ball but the floating majesty of Yachvili's final, 45-metre penalty, which dipped over the bar by a matter of millimetres, was uncontestable.
Damien Traille, the France centre who was playing his first game for five months, looked suitably happy but no one will derive more pleasure from this result than Iain Balshaw, the former Bath flier who is now recast as an honorary Basque. He will have recognised some familiar failings among those now representing his old club, not least an inability to sustain a quality performance for 80 minutes. Bath will always show exhilarating flashes – Abendanon's retrieving tackle on the lightning-quick American wing Takudzwa Ngwenya took some doing – but the whole is not adding up to the sum of its parts.
This is clearly the kind of problem that Sir Ian McGeechan, the club's performance director, is equipped to solve but the home and away games with Ulster in December now loom larger than ever.
"Those two matches will be very important," said Meehan, who could do with a fit Butch James and Lewis Moody as soon as possible. More than anything else, though, Bath need to think clearer and act cuter. When the going gets tough they can, not unlike cuddly old Paddington's distant cousin Winnie the Pooh, look worryingly like bears with very little brain.
Bath Abendanon; Carraro (Bell, 70), Hape, Barkley, Banahan; Vesty, Claassens; Catt (Flatman, 54), Dixon (Batty, 76), Wilson, Hooper, Grewcock (Fernandez-Lobbe, 63), Beattie, Watson (capt), Taylor.
Try Claassens Pens Barkley 2.
Sin-bin Wilson 70.
Biarritz Haylett-Petty; Ngwenya, Gimenez, Bond (Mignardi, 68), Balshaw; Peyrelongue (Traille, 62), Yachvili; Coetzee, Terrain (August, 51), Johnstone (Marconnet, 51), Carizza (Taele, 68), E Lund, M Lund, Harinordoquy, Lakafia (Guyot, 73).
Pens Yachvili 4.
Referee J Jones (Wales). Attendance 11,631.
