By Glen Leat
June 24 2002

Once again there are rumours about a new backs coach for Bath Rugby. This time it's the Aussie Brian Smith. However, search the mass of multi-media information available to us and all you find is...zip. The way the press grapevine works silence indicates that not much is happening.

So what do we reackon then, will it be Smith or will it be someone else? Brian Ashton is a name which always comes to the fore when the two words, "backs" and "coaching" are mentioning in the same breath as Bath Rugby. But then another two words closely follow the first two - "no" and "England", so it looks like no dice there.

To help with my search for an answer I had a quick scan of the internet to see what is known about Brian Smith and up popped this chap:

He's called Brian E Smith but comes from the good old US of A and I have to say doesn't look much like an ex-international Aussie so I guess I must have the wrong bloke.

I then typed in the word "Back" and came up with an interesting site called drback.com though this was just about coping with a bad back instead of anything to do with rugby coaches. I then found a site which advertises a hotel in Canada for women only called The Back Hills. This hotel particularly caters for women who enjoy the company of women and one of the quotes I picked up from the guestbook is "This has been the most enjoyable weekend I have spent in a very long time. The bed was comfortable, the company wonderful , the breakfast delightful surprises and the deer a joy!" So, what did the deer do?

Finally, with shaking hand, I managed to drag myself away from surfing for news on a backs coach for Bath Rugby and checked up on the last ERE Poll (see below) to find out if you feel we could afford to lose Catty should he take the "King's Shilling" and head off to Malcolm's place at Bristol. Given that Catty has made a massive impact on Bath over the years I was amazed that a third of you believe we could afford to lose him. That has to be good news because the only way Bath will progress is to refrain from relying on one player.

Question of the Week Question: Can Bath afford to lose Mike Catt to Bristol? Yes 35% No 29% Disasterous 34% Don't Know 2%

For God's sake Bath, please get a backs coach soon. Not just because I want to know who the new man is but to help me stay sane as otherwise I will be looking at more awlful websites over the coming weeks in my search for news!