Bath have never much liked it here. One of their fondest sons, Olly Barkley, liked it so little, indeed, he could endure only one year as a Gloucester player before heading home. He is not going to like it any more after this. With 13 minutes to go, Barkley's leg snapped midway between the knee and the ankle. He was carried off with an oxygen mask clasped to his face. Who knows when he will be back. Word has it he has fractured his tibia and fibula.
It was an injury that overshadowed a comprehensive win for Gloucester that consolidates third place in the Premiership. Bath are still in fourth, but looking over their shoulders.
Even without the sickening sight of their team-mate's injury, they did not look right. They were well beaten at scrum time, conceding either a penalty or some serious yards, and then a penalty, at the vast majority of them. It meant they spent an undue amount of the game in their own half and were unable to do much about getting out of it, other than to rely on the odd penalty. Gloucester did concede a few of those, but only one was kickable. Bath coughed up six penalties within Nicky Robinson's range (he kicked four of them) and another that Gloucester sent to touch in search of a bonus-point try.
They did not get it then, but they did get it in the dying minutes, courtesy of a contentious decision by the video referee, who decided Tom Voyce had got the ball down marginally before his foot hit the touchline. It was a close one and it denied Bath the losing bonus point they seemed to have won with Ben Williams's try a couple of minutes earlier.
Really, though, the game was not as close as that, even if it had been locked up at 15-15 with Tom Biggs's well-taken try just after half-time. For that, he skinned Nick Wood, who, otherwise, was instrumental in Gloucester's scrummaging excellence. So, too, was England's Paul Doran-Jones, who weighed in with a try – and it involved outpacing someone to the corner, which is always a feather in a prop's cap. That required the video ref's adjudication as well, although it was more clear-cut. Doran-Jones had beaten Pieter Dixon to Robinson's chip, and so Gloucester had their second try just before the break.
It was a similar story, albeit involving more pace, for their first at the end of the first quarter, Henry Trinder winning the race to Rory Lawson's chip. Bath stayed in touch thanks to an accommodating void in the Gloucester defence straight from an attacking lineout, through which Williams surged to set up Matt Banahan. It was more or less Bath's only threat in the first half, which ended with a mere five points between the sides.
After Biggs's try after the break, normal service was resumed, with Gloucester taking it away in the third quarter with two Robinson penalties and Voyce's first try.
Bath did respond, setting up camp in Gloucester territory for the first time. It all ended with Barkley's injury. They could have had a try at that point, with an overlap having been worked, but they lost the chance and one of their best players for the rest of the season. Butch James slung a horrible pass to Barkley that Barkley dropped. In the same sequence, James then fell on Barkley's leg. Snap.
It was a horrible way to blow a try, let alone to end a player's season. It will take an effort of will if it is not to scupper Bath's season as well.
