READ MORE: Sale Sharks 38-17 Bristol Bears LIVE: Reaction and full highlights<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\nThe Bears’ troubles with the EQP quota, which is to average 15 players in a matchday squad over the course of a season, has been caused by their unprecedented injury crisis this season. Lam, explained: \u201cHitting the required average of English-qualified players every season is something I am very proud of at the Bears. To be able to achieve it again in one of our most challenging seasons with so many EQP players unavailable throughout the whole season is a credit to all.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat list has been compounded again this week with Ellis, Fitz and George joining James Williams and a long list of unavailable players.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you add that to the large number of long term EQP unavailability we\u2019ve had to Harry Randall, James Williams, Joe Jenkins, Jack Bates, Gabriel Ibitoye, Noah Heward, Rich Lane Aidan Boshoff in the backs and Gabriel Oghre, Joe Batley, James Dun, Steele Barker, George Taylor, Kofi Cripps, and Paddy Pearce in the forwards throughout the entirety of the campaign, it\u2019s had a significant impact on our EQP numbers.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe applied for some dispensation around our massive EQP injury list and while they RFU had sympathy and understanding for our situation, the regulations don\u2019t permit change this season but it\u2019s something they will consider for the future.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile it\u2019s disappointing to lose so many experienced players, it also presents a fantastic opportunity for some of our younger guys.<\/p>\n
So the likes of Tom Jordan, Louis Rees-Zammit, Benhard Janse van Rensburg and Kalaveti Ravouvou were forced to watch on from the sidelines as Sale exploded into life. England fly-half George Ford opened the scoring and lock Ben Bamber soon doubled Sale\u2019s lead before winger Arron Reed and full-back Joe Carpenter also touched down.<\/p>\n
Bristol hit back with two tries from winger Noah Heward and hooker Tomas Gwilliam before the break. But Sale scored a fifth try through Rekeiti Ma\u2019asi-White and Reed claimed his second before Bristol fly-half Sam Worsley completed the scoring late on.<\/p>\n
Alex Sanderson\u2019s Sharks have made the play-offs in each of the past three campaigns but ended this season in seventh, their lowest placing since finishing in that position in 2018\/19. They needed a point to guarantee a place in next term\u2019s Champions Cup, and a dominant first-half display laid the platform for a thumping six-try win over a Bristol side who finished this season in sixth.<\/p>\n
Having forced Bristol back towards their own line from the first whistle as Joe Owen lost the ball in the air, it came as no surprise when the Sharks claimed an opening score in the second minute. Some neat handling in midfield created the space for Ford to collect possession and saunter over the line unopposed inside the left channel.<\/p>\n
Ford kicked the conversion, and it was not long before the hosts had their second try through Bamber. The imposing lock charged down the right flank and capitalised on a handling error by a Bristol defender to dive over in the corner.<\/p>\n
Ford applied the conversion, and Sale led 14-0, with scrum-half Raffi Quirke causing Bristol plenty of problems on his final appearance before joining Newcastle this summer.<\/p>\n
And Quirke was the architect of their third try in the 16th minute when he sent a delightful chip over the top of the Bears\u2019 defence. Scotland winger Reed raced forward to ground the ball and Ford added the extras to make it 21-0.<\/p>\n
Carpenter got in on the act in the 23rd minute when he supported the attack from full-back and dived over the line on a diagonal run despite the best efforts of Joe Jenkins to stop him on the line.<\/p>\n
Bristol, with so many big guns missing, showed little as an attacking force but scored from a rare attack in the 26th minute when Heward dived over following a break from Harry Thacker and Worsley converted.<\/p>\n
The Bears scored again on the stroke of half-time when Gwilliam went over from close range for an unconverted score which made it 26-12.<\/p>\n
Shortly after the break, Ma\u2019asi-White took Tom Roebuck\u2019s deft offload to score a try which Ford improved with his fourth conversion of the match. Reed was denied his second after narrowly failing to ground the ball under the posts but he soon completed his brace with a fine finish in the right corner.<\/p>\n
Worsley then supported a break late from impressive debutant Ollie Harris to score Bristol\u2019s third touchdown, but was unable to add to his second conversion as Sale outscored their visitors by six tries to three.<\/p>\n
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Sale Sharks:<\/strong> 15. Joe Carpenter, 14. Tom O\u2019Flaherty, 13. Tom Roebuck, 12. Rekeiti Ma\u2019asi-White, 11. Arron Reed, 10. George Ford, 9. Raffi Quirke; 1. Asher Opoku-Fordjour, 2. Nathan Jibulu, 3. James Harper, 4. Ernst van Rhyn (c), 5. Ben Bamber, 6. Sam Dugdale, 7. Seb Kelly, 8. Tom Curry.<\/p>\nReplacements:<\/strong> 16. Alfie Longstaff, 17. Ralph McEachran, 18. Patreece Bell, 19. Hyron Andrews, 20. Reuben Logan, 21. Gus Warr, 22. Luke James, 23. Alex Wills.<\/p>\nBristol Bears:<\/strong> 15. Rich Lane, 14. Noah Heward, 13. Jack Bates, 12. Joe Jenkins, 11. Aidan Boshoff, 10. Sam Worsley, 9. Harry Randall (c), 1. Jake Woolmore, 2. Tomos Gwilliam, 3. Max Lahiff, 4. James Dun, 5. George Taylor, 6. Joe Owen, 7. Harry Thacker, 8. Joe Batley<\/p>\nReplacements:<\/strong> 16. Kieran Hill, 17. Sam Grahamslaw, 18. Lovejoy Chawatama, 19. Jimmy Halliwell, 20. Kenzie Jenkins, 21. Sam Wolstenholme, 22. Max Pepper, 23. Ollie Harris<\/p>\nReferee<\/strong> : Anthony Woodthorpe<\/p>\nARs<\/strong> : Dan Jones & Gareth Holsgrove<\/p>\nTMO:<\/strong> Peter Allan<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bristol Bears were beaten 38-17 away at Sale Sharks on Saturday in Round 18 of the 2025\/26 Gallagher…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1009819,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[8818],"tags":[381,21571,40632,748,393,18194,548,4884,32687,16,15],"class_list":["post-1009818","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bristol","tag-bristol","tag-bristol-bears","tag-bristol-rugby","tag-britain","tag-england","tag-england-rugby-union-team","tag-ford","tag-great-britain","tag-pat-lam","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116704984780770126","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1009818","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1009818"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1009818\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1009819"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1009818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1009818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1009818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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