Chiefs must use hurt in right manner
By Mark Stevens
18/7/19
Rob Baxter insists his Exeter Chiefs must use the hurt of missing out on Gallagher Premiership glory in the “right way” as they gear up for the start of the new 2019/20 season.
For the third time in four years, Devon’s finest saw their hopes of landing the English title denied by rivals Saracens, who edged a thrilling contest at a packed out Twickenham 37-34.
It was a bitter pill for the Chiefs to swallow once again – particularly as they had finished the regular league season top of the pile, eight points clear of the Londoners – but it was the European champions who prospered with a powerful final quarter to the game.
Director of Rugby Baxter admitted large parts of Exeter’s play that day were ‘fantastic’, but that odd errors at key areas came back to bite his side.
“At the end of the day, I can’t sit here and say we were good enough to win because on the day we didn’t win the competition,” said Baxter. “That hurts a bit and it gives us something to fight for.
“If you look at it in boxing terms, we’ve been in four finals, won one of them and we’ve come up second best to the same team on the other occasions. In a lot of ways, we’re kind of No.1 contenders and that is how we have decided to prepare and fight for this season.
“Right now, we’re contenders, not champions. That means we have to do the hard work, just like every other side that wants to win the championship has to do. For us to make that next step, though, we have got to be prepared to go out and work harder than anybody else.
“If we do that in pre-season, then we give ourselves a great opportunity to start the new season well.”
With Bath at home first up in the Premiership Rugby Cup at Sandy Park on Saturday, September 21 (3pm), the Chiefs will use the upcoming weeks to get themselves in fine fettle for that seasonal opener.
Baxter will, however, be minus a number of first-team stars, some of whom have undergone summer operations, but also those who will be heading to Japan for the Rugby World Cup.
“At this stage we’re expecting to contribute a few boys to the World Cup, which is a fantastic scenario,” added Baxter. “Of course there are positives and negatives to that situation, but the positives far outweigh the negatives as far as I am concerned.
“The positives are we have quality players who are capable of playing in the World Cup, some of them for frontline teams in the competition, whilst back here we will have a strong group of players who we can work with and develop ready for the start of another Premiership season.
“It’s how we’ve worked in the past and it’s always been one of our strengths as a club. What I envisage is come the start of the new season we have a strong and solid group of players, all of whom we hope will be singing from the same hymn sheet, and who we expect to set a strong core and strong ethos for the season ahead.”
And having used the summer break to not only recharge the batteries, but review last season – including the final itself – Baxter says lessons will be learnt in the wake of that campaign.
“I don’t mind saying, it took a while before I sat down and reviewed the final,” said Baxter. “I’ve done that now and as a group we will talk about that and then look to move on.
“There is a truth it was a good game, the players know they got close, and that they achieved a lot of good things on the day. At the same time, the players will know they made some mistakes which, ultimately, cost us.
“We will address both sides of that. We will talk about the good things that we were able to bring to the game, but we will also look at those moments where we let ourselves down. The job of a good team, a good coaching group, is to find ways to turn those moments our way.
“That is certainly what we will talk about this pre-season to make sure we make less of those bad moments happen and to make sure more of those good moments happen. I know it sounds simple, but it will take a little more than just a simple chat.
“We know we are not a million miles off, but we also have to acknowledge that we’ve lost three finals out of four. It is something where we have to use any hurt or any pain in the right way.”