TEN-TRY HARLEQUINS CRUISE TO CHAMPIONS CUP ROUT OF UNDERSTRENGTH BAYONNE

Christmas is a time for giving and Bayonne presented this game to Harlequins by selecting an inexperienced side who realistically stood no chance. Manu Tuilagi and Gareth Anscombe were listed as injured, along with plenty of others, but four frontline players were rested. There was nothing wrong with Bayonne giving Jonah Thompson, a 20-year-old Australian, his professional debut against rugby royalty in south-west London: but the fact he is a flanker, and was pressed into service on the right wing, was arguably pushing it a bit far.

The Champions Cup is supposedly an elite competition and that should be celebrated whenever appropriate. But the current format means too many clubs are selecting weakened sides for matches they regard as unwinnable – or rather, when they think others are more winnable. It is short-changing fans. Quins scored 10 tries, nine of them converted by Marcus Smith, the player of the match, but it rarely felt as if they were obliged to change up from second gear.

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“We can only play what they put out there,” said the Harlequins senior coach, Jason Gilmore. “It’s a bit like that in the Champions Cup at the moment. Are the travelling teams full strength all the time? Probably not. But you’ve got to make sure you get your five points at home.”

The hosts, initially, proved incapable of holding on to their own ball when it counted. There was early pace and tempo, but handling errors too from Luke Northmore and Oscar Beard. Smith finally injected a bit of quality, dabbing a grubber kick for Cadan Murley to score on 22 minutes.

Tom Spring, Bayonne’s young fly-half, then failed to read a Smith cross-kick, allowing the second-row Kieran Treadwell to gallop over, and Fin Baxter capitalised on more weak defending to score from close range. That was 21-0 – apparently game over – unless the visitors could muster a comeback like Glasgow’s magnificent effort against Toulouse and Antoine Dupont on Saturday.

When Spring chased a kick over the top and the Argentinian Lucas Paulos burrowed over, Will Evans was shown a yellow card into the bargain. At 21-7 and with Quins a man down, the threat of a contest hung in the air, before the prop Pedro Delgado surged over for his first Harlequins five-pointer. A bonus point secured, to go with the one Quins claimed in losing to Leinster last weekend.

After the break, when the scrum-half Will Porter darted over in the corner, Smith added a fifth conversion and that was 35-7. Spring’s lively running led to a second Bayonne try when he jinked over on the right having accepted a beautiful one-handed offload by the hooker Lucas Martin. Porter added his second try before Chandler Cunningham-South, ominously for Bayonne, appeared off the home bench.

Baptiste Heguy was the second visiting player to be sent to the sin-bin, leaving them with 13 men for a minute or so, and another Quins replacement, Sam Riley, capitalised with two tries inside five minutes.

Jamie Benson ran in the ninth, Thompson’s profound lack of wing experience exposed again. The Australian should have a bright future and none of this is his fault. Blame the format, blame the coaches, but don’t blame him. The Ireland international Treadwell made it 10 tries but it was long since over by then.

Asked if fans want full-strength sides competing in the Champions Cup Gilmore said: “I think the players do too. They’re competitive beasts. There’s probably different factors in that, when you’re squishing the competition amongst Gallagher Prem and Top 14.

“We had this last week, we rested a few players, but by international guidelines you’ve got to … it’s hard to get the balance of it all in terms of mixing competitions, but I just look at what the boys want. They want the best every week. Is that possible for clubs? It can be really difficult.”

2025-12-14T15:21:40Z