Bath are the defensive experts of the Premiership. No side has conceded fewer tries and the visitors' brickwall rearguard helped ensure they headed back home down the M4 on Saturday night with a hard-earned victory.
It was desperately close, though. Shontayne Hape has not had the happiest of seasons, virtually sidelined in England's calamitous World Cup campaign. Facing the side he left during the summer, the London Irish centre, who was making his Premiership debut for his new club, conceded a penalty in front of the posts, three minutes from time, when the referee, David Rose, judged that he had handled the ball in a ruck.
It was a harsh decision, but Sam Vesty, who had missed his previous three kicks at goal, wasn't going to worry about that. He landed the winning penalty and, despite a desperate surge by the Irish pack in the closing moment, Bath held out, scrambled the ball back to their fly‑half and Vesty joyfully kicked the ball into the stand.
Bath sported a hideous new away strip, their white shirts looking as if buckets of blue paint had been thrown at them, and the game was not too easy on the eye either. Irish's head coach, Toby Booth, was unhappy with the refereeing and particularly incensed at the decision to penalise Hape, whom he claimed had been on his feet when the referee blew his whistle. But Bath deserved their victory. Irish hardly had a glimpse of the tryline and Bath scored the only tries of the game.
The visitors prevailed despite having a host of injuries. Lewis Moody began the week by announcing he was leaving the international scene and he was missing here, too, with a leg injury, while the absence of Olly Barkley and Dan Hipkiss forced Bath to play Matt Banahan in the centre to help neutralise the threat of Hape and his new pals.
Vesty may be keeping the seat warm before Stephen Donald arrives at the Rec next week, but he made a big impact here. After a largely shapeless first 35 minutes, Bath won a lineout and worked the ball infield for Banahan to charge forward. The centre was stopped, but Bath recycled the ball and Michael Claassens slipped a pass to Vesty, who broke David Paice's tackle to score the first try.
It came just as Irish were regrouping, Delon Armitage having been shown a yellow card for a high tackle on the Bath wing, Tom Biggs, who had found space down the left touchline. Armitage's tackle was high and dangerous, and Biggs needed treatment and was too dazed to return for the second half. It has been a pretty awful month, too, for Armitage who was one of England's better performers in New Zealand. The full-back's citing for a late tackle on Scotland's Chris Paterson meant he missed the World Cup quarter-final against France three weeks ago.
After the break, though, Irish hauled themselves back into the game. In the wing, Tom Homer, they have the Premiership's highest points scorer and he took his tally to 117 with four second-half penalties, two coming when Bath were judged to have brought down Irish's scrum, which was strengthened in the second half by the introduction of Alex Corbisiero.
But in between the kicking exhibitions from Homer, Bath managed to fashion another try. Dave Attwood, who had just returned to the field after a blood injury, found space on the right-hand touchline and, despite the efforts of the Irish scrum-half, Darren Allinson, to bundle him into touch, he was just able to squeeze in at the corner. The television official, David Grashoff, took an age to deliberate and there were boos from around the ground, but the decision was a correct one.
