European Champions Cup: Bath into quarter-finals with 20-15 win over Glasgow
Last Updated: 26/01/15 1:04pm
A dominant forwards' display yielded two penalty tries and saw Bath to a 20-15 win over Glasgow at the Recreation Ground and a Champions Cup quarter-final trip to Leinster.
The game was a shoot-out for a place in the last eight with Toulouse surprisingly edged in Montpellier, but it was Mike Ford's men who came out on top in a thriller that ended with Glasgow finishing the game pressing in vain for a decisive third try.
There was bad news for Bath, and potentially England, after just four minutes when centre Kyle Eastmond was forced off nursing what appeared to be a shoulder injury - and it soon got worse for the hosts.
In-form wing DTH van der Merwe was the architect for the visitors, shrugging off a poor tackle from Chris Cook and supplying an inside ball that allowed Alex Dunbar to scamper away from the defence and touch down. Fly-half Finn Russell added the conversion.
George Ford was off-target with a badly-miscued penalty on the quarter-hour and Bath had already survived another scare with Dunbar breaking through by the time the England fly-half eventually opened his account in the 28th minute.
The deficit was cut to a single point when Ford punished Fraser Brown's killing of the ball with his second penalty, although the home fans headed for half-time refreshments concerned at their side's inability to transfer their superiority in the set to the scoreboard.
Glasgow head coach Gregor Townsend reacted to his side's first-half scrummaging struggles by sending on props Jon Welsh and Jerry Yanuyanutawa but it was impressive hands in the loose that helped Warriors score one of the tries of the tournament in the 49th minute.
Russell spotted an overlap deep in his own territory and threw an ambitious miss-pass that set his team in motion. Fantastic offloads from Mark Bennett and Henry Pyrgos continued the momentum, allowing Richie Vernon to race into the corner unopposed.
The Bath response was immediate and emphatic. The forwards took matters into their own hands and pressurised their Glasgow counterparts from the off - forcing a turnover and than barrelling towards the line, prompting visiting captain Ali Kellock to collapse the maul, conceding a penalty try and earning himself a yellow card.
A Russell penalty edged Warriors back in front 15-13 and after Ford had pulled another attempt at goal wide at the other end, fantastic defence from Russell and Sean Maitland prevented Anthony Watson from touching down after an electrifying three-quarter move involving Ford and Jonathan Joseph.
Sam Burgess briefly entered the fray in the 66th minute with Ford departing for a concussion check but again it was the forwards doing the damage for Bath - this time the scrum resulting from Watson being held up resulting in another penalty try as the Warriors forwards folded.
Warriors threw everything at Bath in the final 10 minutes and it needed an heroic covering tackle from Matt Banahan to prevent Tommy Seymour from collecting his own grubber kick, with Maitland held up inches short of the line moments before the final whistle was greeted with a roar.
