Just over 12 months on from his former club Worcester Warrior’s sorry decline and Ollie Lawrence is in the form of his life. He may have arrived at Bath Rugby in difficult circumstances but the move has arguably transformed his career.
This season the centre already has three Premiership tries in just two games and the England player is grateful to playing again “It’s nice to be back with the boys and in the Premiership”
Lawrence has benefited greatly from the new attacking shapes implemented by new attack coach Lee Blackett as well as the arrival of Finn Russell.
“Having World class players like Finn Russell makes it a lot easier for some of us outside backs e of because he feeds us with great ball and just watching him do his stuff is pretty cool, to be honest”
The centre arrived at Bath after England’s dramatic semi-final loss to South Africa and their third-place-play off win over Argentina playing more than 30 minutes just once in the entire campaign. “Being able to play 80 minutes in back-back games is really good.”
The centre has made the Bath No. 13 jersey his own since his arrival and with the depth at Bath vast Lawrence will work with some of the best talents in the Premiership. “Both Max Ojomoh and Cameron Redpath are great players in their own right, both like to attack the line so it’s exciting to have options in the centres and we can all adapt to playing with each other”
Friday night’s clash against Bristol at the Rec gave the former Worcester centre a chance to play on the greats in Vimri Vakatawa.” He was an incredible player for Racing and I’ve said I always want to face the best so it was great to face him.”
“We started really well and managed to get on top of Bristol for a good passage of play but we fell off for the final minutes of the first half and into the second”
Johann van Graan’s side claimed a narrow win on Friday night thanks to two first-half tries one of which was scored by Lawrence.”Last year the forwards definitely scored a lot more than us so it’s great to be able to finish some moves of ourselves.”
Bath currently sit second in the table after a third of the season played already and have lofty ambitions. “With the squad and talent we have, we certainly know we can win more games this season.. last year we probably only played our best rugby towards the end of the campaign so it’s a good start to the season this year.”
“The belief is certainly there this year”
Bath will need all that belief and more in their upcoming game against Sale Sharks at the AJBell a venue where they have won one of their past five games.
