The Six Nations championship is just around the corner and games like this help to separate the men from the mere pretenders. Stuart Lancaster is due to visit Bath's training headquarters on Monday and, on this evidence, the names of George Ford and Anthony Watson will be high on his agenda as he seeks to inject fresh back-line impetus before England's opening game against France in Paris on 1 February.
Although Ford, 20, and the 19-year-old Watson could not quite bring home what was threatening to be only Bath's second league win at Welford Road since the Premiership was launched, they showed enough to suggest both will win full caps at some stage in 2014. Given Ford was employed by Leicester until last summer, his assured display under intense personal pressure was a sure sign of an international playmaker-in-waiting.
It was made all the more significant by the presence among the opposition of Toby Flood, whose status as an England squad member will come to an abrupt end if he opts to play his club rugby in France. In that event Lancaster will look elsewhere, with Ford and Northampton's Stephen Myler heading the queue. "If they don't pick Toby then George must be one of the front-runners," suggested Ford's father, Mike, who may just make the same point to Lancaster when he sees him.
And yet, from 27-17 ahead with less than 15 minutes left, Bath still could not quite trim the Tigers' claws. Leicester, for now, remain outside the top four but the cussedness of champions is still there, with the back-rowers Thomas Waldrom and Jamie Gibson scoring tries in a determined last-quarter onslaught. It left the young Welsh stand-off Owen Williams with a kick to win the game from the right touchline only for the ball to fade wide and permit Bath to leave with two points rather than one.
In the context of past matches between the clubs it was a minor triumph. Bath's only previous Premiership win here was in November 2003 when they sneaked home by a solitary point. In 87 trips to their old rivals they have won just 11 times and very few of those encounters have been pretty. This was a completely different contest, as entertaining as it was gripping, and the visitors played well enough to suggest they may yet play a part in the end-of-season play-offs.
The initial signs had not been promising, Miles Benjamin being worked free on the right by Flood and Louis Deacon, and Williams extending the lead to 8-0 with a prodded low penalty. A long-term injury to Dan Bowden and Anthony Allen's late withdrawal, however, have further stretched the Tigers in midfield and, with a quarter of an hour gone, Nick Abendanon found a gap which might not normally have existed. Watson still had plenty to do but the youngster's speed and agility helped him skip inside Niall Morris and underline why England are so excited about his potential.
Just as Leicester were reassuring themselves that lightning could not strike twice it did so. The twinkling Ford escaped Julian Salvi's clutches and his inside ball sent the Springbok Francois Louw diving gleefully over. Bath are more than just a bunch of glamour boys, with Matt Garvey and Carl Fearns getting through a mountain of work, but they do have an increasing number of individuals capable of influencing big games like this one.
A 20-14 half-time lead was certainly deserved, despite the best efforts of Gibson and Ed Slater to restore order. Worse was to follow for the Tigers when Ford again spotted half a gap and slipped a scoring ball to the lurking Jonathan Joseph, another England midfield wannabe, on his left.
Was it forward? The naked eye suggested it may have been but the television match official, Geoff Warren, decreed otherwise to considerable local disapproval.
It took the sin-binning of the Bath captain, Stuart Hooper, during a period of heavy Leicester bombardment, to change the mood, with Waldrom scoring beneath a heap of bodies to set up an absorbing finish. Bath did not panic but crucially surrendered possession to give their hosts one final chance of salvation. As against Montpellier last month, a sniff was all the Tigers needed, the French replacement David Mélé giving Gibson just enough space to crash through Matt Banahan's attempted tackle.
Had Williams landed the conversion, with his captain Flood looking on, it would have brought the house down but Richard Cockerill, Leicester's director of rugby, was not completely broken-hearted. "If you've got everyone fit and you don't win you'd be more upset," he said. His side remain in good shape to reach the last eight of the Heineken Cup and, with 10 games left, are level on points with fourth-placed Harlequins. Their rivals have not heard the last of them yet.
Leicester Tigers Tait; Morris, Goneva, Flood (capt), Benjamin; Williams, B Youngs (Mélé, 64); Ayerza, T Youngs, Cole, Deacon, Slater (De Chaves, 59), Gibson, Salvi, Crane (Waldrom, 63).
Tries Benjamin, Waldrom, Gibson. Pens Williams 4.
Bath Abendanon (Agulla, 76); Watson, Joseph, Eastmond (DeVoto, 73), Banahan; Ford, Stringer (Roberts, 60); James (Catt, 60), Webber (Guinazu, 72), Perenise (Orlandi, 68), Hooper (capt), Attwood, Garvey, Louw, Fearns (Houston, 68).
Tries Watson, Louw, Joseph. Cons Ford 3. Pens Ford 2.
Sin-bin Hooper 61.
Referee JP Doyle (RFU). Attendance 22,479.
