Bristol Bears lost two of their starting three backrow players to injuries inside the first 18 minutes of Friday night’s PREM Rugby Cup 49-19 defeat to Bath Rugby, to pile further pressure on the depleted under-strain squad.

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Flanker Kofi Cripps and Argentina international number eight Ben Grondona both departed in the first quarter of the cup clash to disrupt Bristol’s flow, having initially taken the lead through a maul try, finished off by hooker Tomas Gwilliam, who went on to score a brace in an 80-minute shift, with Gabriel Oghre warming the bench for the hosts with no other hookers fit and available. And Oghre looks likely to get an England A call-up this week ahead of the clash with an All Blacks XV at the Rec next Saturday.

Providing some insight on the latest injuries, Bristol head of academy John Barnes said: “Kofi’s (Cripps) on crutches at the moment and Ben’s a bit sore at the shoulder, so Kofi’s probably worse than Ben at the moment. The medics will give us a round-up and feedback. But yeah, it was disappointing to lose players early on. I think that was a bit of a disruption as well. It didn’t help that we were on and off with a few boys, but that’s the game.”

The Bears also saw winger Josh Carrington depart for an HIA with blood flowing from his head in the latter stages of the contest having only just returned from a previous head knock. Meanwhile, emergency injury cover signing Toby Fricker was unavailable for the game, having been selected on the wing for the USA against Scotland this weekend. The latest trio of injuries leaves Bristol director of rugby Pat Lam in a further selection predicament with an exhibition game against an Argentina XV next Friday, while every other club in the PREM have a rare weekend off.

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One bright spot from the second defeat to Bath in as many weeks was the performance of Welsh international scrum-half Ellis Bevan, who came on at half-time for his debut, having arrived on Monday, a four-week loan from Cardiff Rugby, and made a massive impact for the Bears. He scored straight away, diving over the try-line after a driving maul from the forwards had sucked in the defence to open up enough space to snipe over.

Reflecting on Bevan’s performance, Barnes said: “You can see he’s an international player. He picks up stuff quickly and he’s been thrown in at the deep end. We knew he had to play 40 minutes because of Sam Wolstenholme’s first game back from injury. Apart from the first kick, I thought he had a really good 39 minutes. So fair play. He’s with us for three weeks now and he has fitted in seamlessly.”

In a game completely dominated by the Bath forwards, a young Bears side with three debutants came away with no match points as defending champions managed to defend them from scoring the all-important bonus point fourth try, while touching down seven times themselves through Kepu Tuipulotu and winger Charlie Griffin, who both recorded braces, and single scores for Billy Sela, Arthur Green and Will Butt. Makeshift fly-half Tom de Glanville landed all seven conversion attempts.

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Barnes said, “I think the game is about small margins. Bath were brilliant at taking their chances. I think every time they got into our 22, they executed well with their power game, which is what Bath are about and that’s why they’re champions.

“We were a little disappointed we didn’t take some of our chances, just to stay in the game. I think it’s not about going on and winning necessarily, but to stay in the game and stay within a score or two. Once they got two or three scores ahead, it was easy to kick it long and just play simple stuff. We were chasing the bonus point and unfortunately, we didn’t get that either.”