Leicester Tigers v Bath Rugby, Welford Road, Saturday 4.30pm

[Tigersman]

Leicester Tigers
15 Zack Henry, 14 Harry Potter, 13 George Worth (vc), 12 Guy Porter, 11 Harry Simmons, 10 Johnny McPhillips, 9 Ben White (c)
1 Nephi Leatigaga, 2 Jake Kerr, 3 Joe Heyes, 4 Tomás Lavanini, 5 Blake Enever, 6 George Martin, 7 Luke Wallace (vc), 8 Thom Smith

Replacements
16 Charlie Clare, 17 Ryan Bower, 18 Dan Cole, 19 Cameron Henderson, 20 Jordan Coghlan, 21 Jack Van Poortvliet, 22 Tom Hardwick, 23 Freddie Steward

v
BATH RUGBY SIDE TO FACE LEICESTER TIGERS
15. Anthony Watson, 14. Semesa Rokoduguni, 13. Jonathan Joseph, 12. Cameron Redpath, 11. Ruaridh McConnochie, 10. Rhys Priestland, 9. Ben Spencer; 1. Lewis Boyce, 2. Tom Dunn, 3. Will Stuart, 4. Josh McNally, 5. Charlie Ewels (C), 6. Tom Ellis, 7. Sam Underhill, 8. Taulupe Faletau

REPLACEMENTS
16. Jack Walker, 17. Beno Obano, 18. Christian Judge, 19. Elliott Stooke, 20. Josh Bayliss, 21. Will Chudley, 22. Josh Matavesi, 23. Tom de Glanville

[Tigersman]

Slight only slight difference between the two teams on paper.....

From interviews sounds like bench player will most likely be starting/involved in the midweek unless they have to play a large amount of minutes.

[twitchy]

Is thom smith any good?

[Tigersman]

Is thom smith any good?

I rate him as a grafter.
More Corry than Dynamic modern 8 though.
Of the players promoted in his year at Tigers I rated him the most. Reckon type that could be a excellent club 8 without International.

[Scrumhead]

Oof ... bit of a mismatch there. Fans or no fans, I still wouldn’t have picked that side for my first home game!

[Puja]

Still a lock at blindside! What the actual f*ck!?

Looks like we're concentrating on midweek.

Puja

[Epaminondas Pules]

Some serious rotation. Good to see Steward possibly get game time with experienced players around him.......

Looks like a seriously long day at the office, but if you’re going to rotate then rotate, so fair play on that. But this is a total mismatch on paper.

[Scrumhead]

What about Harry Simmons (a scrum half) up against Roko on the wing ... could be bad ...

[Puja]

I wonder if Harry Simmons is seen as a wing going forward (in the Healey mould). I know he can play 15, but I thought he was focussing on 9 - to chuck him in at 11 is a bold call, especially with Steward an option.

Puja

[Tigersman]

Yeh Simmons first game as a winger v Roko could go bad.
He did play really well at 15 v Bath a few years ago.

My gut feeling is with White, JVP, Law and Edwards coming up this might be needed from his POV.
Martin as a blindside doesn't worry me too much if it wasn't for Ilione I could see Martin potentially being our future 6. He's a excellent carrier.

[fivepointer]

Tigers taking the rotation route, Bath sticking with most of their starters from Saturday. Advantage to the visitors you would expect.
Interesting to see how Redpath gets on and can Spencer follow up his promising debut.
I'm all in favour of youngsters getting starts but is it really fair for Martin and Simmons to be played out of position. Are they really going to be able to do themselves justice?

[Banquo]

Tigers taking the rotation route, Bath sticking with most of their starters from Saturday. Advantage to the visitors you would expect.
Interesting to see how Redpath gets on and can Spencer follow up his promising debut.
I'm all in favour of youngsters getting starts but is it really fair for Martin and Simmons to be played out of position. Are they really going to be able to do themselves justice?

No. Its not fair to any youngster to be put into such a hotch potch and on paper well outclassed side. I'd rather collusion than this

[Which Tyler]

Tigers taking the rotation route, Bath sticking with most of their starters from Saturday. Advantage to the visitors you would expect.
Interesting to see how Redpath gets on and can Spencer follow up his promising debut.
I'm all in favour of youngsters getting starts but is it really fair for Martin and Simmons to be played out of position. Are they really going to be able to do themselves justice?

Every Bath fan predicted this when the initial fixtures were announced.
Our 2 mid-week fixtures are:
Away to Northampton - which we'd expect to lose anyway (based on the season to date), so might as well send the 2nd XV.
Home to Worcester - which will have some heads being scratched, but it's probably still best to send the 2nds out, and keep the 1sts for each weekend.

This selection suggests that Bath 2nds will be captained by Zach, and have Matevesi at FH

[FKAS]

We've got Gloucester next weekend and LI mid week. Common sense is surely that you keep a strong 15 for the weekend games and use the second string Vs Irish. Mix the benches around and maybe keep some experienced players in. Why are we giving Bath the opportunity to notch up a record breaking win at WR?

There's some players with a lot of potential that are going to have to pull out a blinder to get anything here. Nearly three years ago a very inexperienced Tigers team did got to the Rec and pull the trousers down of a far more experienced Bath outfit who just grabbed the win at the end. Fingers crossed of a repeat.

[Which Tyler]

We've got Gloucester next weekend and LI mid week. Common sense is surely that you keep a strong 15 for the weekend games and use the second string Vs Irish. Mix the benches around and maybe keep some experienced players in. Why are we giving Bath the opportunity to notch up a record breaking win at WR?

There's some players with a lot of potential that are going to have to pull out a blinder to get anything here. Nearly three years ago a very inexperienced Tigers team did got to the Rec and pull the trousers down of a far more experienced Bath outfit who just grabbed the win at the end. Fingers crossed of a repeat.

Whilst beating the 2014 score would be lovely, that's still a huge ask.
I'd take a 2 point win anyway.

I expect to see a Bath victory, somewhere in between those 2 extremes.

[Digby]

I think the game this reminds me of is a preseason game between LI and Munster when LI picked a few youngsters but gave them plenty of experience to play alongside whereas Munster just went full on doolally and picked nowt but academy players and maybe even the odd toddler. I can remember thinking how cross I'd be were I a young player in the Munster side not being given the same chance to put forward a case with the advantage of playing alongside better players

Munster smashed Irish

[Banquo]

I think the game this reminds me of is a preseason game between LI and Munster when LI picked a few youngsters but gave them plenty of experience to play alongside whereas Munster just went full on doolally and picked nowt but academy players and maybe even the odd toddler. I can remember thinking how cross I'd be were I a young player in the Munster side not being given the same chance to put forward a case with the advantage of playing alongside better players

Munster smashed Irish

That did occur to me- but the Bath side is rammed with internationals and mostly bloody good ones.

[Digby]

I think the game this reminds me of is a preseason game between LI and Munster when LI picked a few youngsters but gave them plenty of experience to play alongside whereas Munster just went full on doolally and picked nowt but academy players and maybe even the odd toddler. I can remember thinking how cross I'd be were I a young player in the Munster side not being given the same chance to put forward a case with the advantage of playing alongside better players

Munster smashed Irish

That did occur to me- but the Bath side is rammed with internationals and mostly bloody good ones.

History says when I'm certain there's a good chance I'm still wrong, and I am certain this can only go one way

[Banquo]

I think the game this reminds me of is a preseason game between LI and Munster when LI picked a few youngsters but gave them plenty of experience to play alongside whereas Munster just went full on doolally and picked nowt but academy players and maybe even the odd toddler. I can remember thinking how cross I'd be were I a young player in the Munster side not being given the same chance to put forward a case with the advantage of playing alongside better players

Munster smashed Irish

That did occur to me- but the Bath side is rammed with internationals and mostly bloody good ones.

History says when I'm certain there's a good chance I'm still wrong, and I am certain this can only go one way

[FKAS]

We've got Gloucester next weekend and LI mid week. Common sense is surely that you keep a strong 15 for the weekend games and use the second string Vs Irish. Mix the benches around and maybe keep some experienced players in. Why are we giving Bath the opportunity to notch up a record breaking win at WR?

There's some players with a lot of potential that are going to have to pull out a blinder to get anything here. Nearly three years ago a very inexperienced Tigers team did got to the Rec and pull the trousers down of a far more experienced Bath outfit who just grabbed the win at the end. Fingers crossed of a repeat.

Whilst beating the 2014 score would be lovely, that's still a huge ask.
I'd take a 2 point win anyway.

I expect to see a Bath victory, somewhere in between those 2 extremes.

High scoring game and you win by 2 giving Tigers 2 league points from the game I'll take that given the side we've named.

[twitchy]

I hate bath's kit.

[Raggs]

I wouldn't be upset if Bath lost this.

[twitchy]

Stuart is a proper unit isn't he.

[FKAS]

Bath look good ball in hand but the Tigers intensity is good. Result does look inevitable though.

Tigers have the millstone that is McPhillips at 10. Rubbish crossfield kicks with good ball. Just wasting half decent territory.

[Raggs]

Lavinini is such a dirty player.