They won the league six times in eight seasons from 1989 to 1996, the rugby was sublime, and their swagger was summed up in a see-it-to-believe-it moment at Saracens in 1993 when England internationals Jeremy Guscott and Ben Clarke bungee-jumped from cranes behind the ground to celebrate the latest title, just before going on a Lions tour.
For the tale of what happened next, an essential watch is the 1997 BBC TV documentary The Rugby Club. It shows the seismic culture shock at Bath after the sport went professional. Everyone was adjusting, but Bath had the most to lose.
“It was no one’s fault; just that it was all new and we didn’t know what we were doing, really.
Jeremy Guscott made over 250 club appearances for Bath (Photo: Getty)
Former Bath owner Andrew Brownsword had a successful business selling greetings cards with cuddly bears on them, but he wasn’t prepared for this.
“Other clubs could see the wheels had come off,” Sleightholme says. “I remember going to Gloucester shortly after it screened, and I just got abused by the Shed for the whole game.”
When the Premiership succeeded the Courage Leagues in 1997-98, Andy Robinson was Bath’s coach, briefly assisted by Sir Clive Woodward, and the club won the European Cup final against Brive.
Three weeks later Bath were humiliated, 68-12 at local rivals Gloucester. Ultimately there was no relegation, but Bath had never previously finished lower than sixth.
2003 to 2010
England head coach Steve Borthwick spent 10 years at the Rec (Photo: Getty)Steve Borthwick was never the type to make a public outburst during his time as captain of Bath but he ran out of patience with the Brownsword regime after losing the European Challenge Cup final to Clermont Auvergne in 2007.
“Players are asking why we are not making signings. We see other clubs with fantastic training facilities, where are ours? Where’s the investment in our club?”
These were the nearly years. Bath lost to Wasps in the 2004 Premiership final and were beaten in three semi-finals in a row: 2008, 2009 and 2010.
David Flatman was a loosehead prop at Bath for nine years from 2003 and he tells The i Paper the way it degenerated still hurts like hell.
square RUGBY UNION Bath vs Leicester is the perfect answer to rugby’s breakaway circus
Read More
“John Connolly, Michael Foley, Richard Graham and Brian Smith were a great coaching team. We would have laid in the road for Connolly. [Second row] Steve Borthwick was nothing like the rest of us but he loved us and we loved him.
It grew even darker around 2008 and 2009.
“He was the most important person in our team, our club, by a long way, and all he effectively said was ‘treat me with respect, please’. The only reason to fall out with him was he would treat the head coach like an equal, and they couldn’t handle the friction.
Flatman remembers players jettisoned for spending too long injured; contractually correct, but hated by the squad.
“We were getting there, it felt magic again. Then in the drugs scandal [in 2009], three of the players never tested positive but they missed tests, and the overall effect was us losing a handful of first-class players we were unable to replace that summer. Andy Higgins was a major character, Alex Crockett was really important to us, Michael Lipman was tough as coffin nails.
Not even George Ford could end their long wait for a trophy (Photo: Getty)
In 2010, Bruce Craig, who had made a fortune transporting pharmaceuticals, became Bath’s main backer.
Craig gave Bath palatial training facilities at Farleigh House – another case of see it to believe it; critics said it made the players too pampered. He gave them Sir Ian McGeechan, Gary Gold, Mike Ford, Todd Blackadder and Stuart Hooper as directors of rugby.
Successive finishes in the Premiership of ninth in 2015-16, fifth, sixth, sixth, fourth and seventh led to the nadir of 2021-22: 13th and last place in the Premiership, with Bath spared the drop by a Covid-related moratorium on relegation. In an echo of 2002, they lost 64-0 at Gloucester in April 2022.
I worked for Bruce for a while after playing, though I don’t know him well. He wasn’t like us, and people would say he’s too involved. But it’s all his money.
2022 to 2025
Craig took his latest gamble in autumn 2021, hiring the Munster head coach Johann van Graan – a South African who had helped the Bulls win Super Rugby and coached the Springboks’ 2015 World Cup semi-final forwards – for the 2022-23 season. Then Craig recruited Edward Griffiths, a prime architect of the Saracens upswing, for a root-and-branch review of Bath.
“And he said, ‘I’m in the Bahamas’, so I looked up flights for 10 minutes, called him back, and said ‘can you pick me up at Nassau airport tomorrow at three o’clock?’ By the end of that, he was suggesting I should become executive chairman of the club, preparing for what was to follow.”
Finn Russell has transformed Bath’s fortunes after joining the club two years ago (Photo: Getty)“It’s interesting how a squad can be turned around quickly,” Griffiths says.
“Rory Murray, the head of medical brought from Bristol, is outstanding; Sarah Jenner the nutritionist from Munster. So much of top rugby is about medical. Having a top player available who might otherwise not have been, is huge. In the past Bath had been happy to pour resources into players but not so happy to put them into people who look after players.
Griffiths says he would not have recruited the expensive Scotland fly-half Finn Russell, who arrived in 2023, “if you were looking to build a squad with a strong culture and to develop sustained success. But by all accounts, he has been absolutely exceptional, inspired, and Bruce and Johann should take full credit for that.”
square RUGBY UNION InterviewJoe Marler: I was destroying everything good around me
Read More
Craig and Griffiths parted ways after four months but they had “given the system a jolt”.
Insiders say they have worked on adding a killer instinct; to have the leeway in Van Graan’s core “process” to slam the foot to the floor if an attack is on. Van Graan is seen as a rock who can handle his assistant coaches being blunt with him, as long as they have evidence.
They will have incoming England back Henry Arundell next season to add pace. The 8200-capacity Rec of 2002 now holds 14,500 and it still needs rebuilding but it remains a treat to visit.
“I still live in central Bath, and there is not a lot going on apart from the rugby, it’s like the southwest of France in that way,” Flatman says.
“I went out for dinner last week, half an hour outside Bath, and the Romanian chef there said he’d taken two days off for the Premiership final. They have to win it now.”
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( How English rugby’s most dominant club went title-less for 29 years )
Also on site :