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Coach Neal Hatley urges Bath Rugby to tighten up in defence despite big win over London Welsh

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First-team coach Neal Hatley has called for Bath Rugby to sharpen up in defence despite romping to a 53-26 victory over newly-promoted London Welsh on Saturday.

Bath touched down seven times in an 11-try cracker at The Rec to make it two wins from two at the start of the new Aviva Premiership season.

However, it was the four scores conceded to a Welsh side who failed to get on the scoreboard last weekend that ensured the Bath coaching were far from satisfied from their day's work.

Bath now face consecutive matches against Leicester Tigers, Northampton Saints and Saracens and forwards boss Hatley knows his troops must improve if they are to continue their flying start.

"It's mixed emotions. To score 50 points against anyone is an outstanding effort but to concede four tries at home is nowhere near good enough," said Hatley.

"We're really disappointed with the way we defended and we're going to have to defend a lot better over the next few weeks.

"We talked all week about how there'd be a backlash from them and I just think we lacked a little bit of urgency in crucial areas.

"We could have knocked two or three of their tries off. We had opportunities to do that in the phases but didn't take them and in this league you pay the price.

"If you score 53 points you've got to be reasonably happy but there are always things to work on.

"We're pleased with a lot of the stuff we did in attack and feel we probably left a few more tries out there. Over the next two or three weeks we'll get fewer opportunities and we have to make those count."

Bath will be sweating over the fitness of winger Anthony Watson after the youngster was withdrawn just before half-time after suffering an ankle injury.

Watson, who signed a contract extension at The Rec until 2017 earlier in the week, wore a protective boot on his right foot after the game and will go for a scan on Monday.

England prop Davey Wilson also went off injured at the same time but Hatley says he has not suffered any serious damage.

"Davey was a bit more of a precautionary one as he started to feel a bit of a bang and when you've got people like Henry Thomas on the bench you don't want to be taking chances," added Hatley.

"Anthony's looked a little bit more serious but he was up and moving around in the changing rooms, so we'll know more on Monday when we get that scanned.

"It was innocuous and he just went over on his ankle. It's nowhere near as bad as the ankle injury he had last season."

Coach Neal Hatley urges Bath Rugby to tighten up in defence despite big win over London Welsh


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