Rob Baxter has put Exeter Chiefs' trip to Leicester at the centre of their push for the Premiership play-offs, saying the match on Sunday is one of two games that will decide whether they stay in the race. Exeter go into the weekend fourth in the table after being beaten by Harlequins at Twickenham in their last Premiership match.
The timing matters. Leicester Tigers are third, seven points ahead of Exeter, while Saracens are fifth, three points behind the Chiefs, and Bristol are sixth, two points further back. Because the Leicester game is the final Premiership fixture of the weekend, Exeter will know where Saracens sit before kick-off, and Baxter said that makes the trip even more significant.
“I'm trying not to get too caught up in all the permutations that can happen by the time we even play on Sunday, because loads of things can happen,” he said. “Whatever way things go, the Leicester game is going to be important, the Saracens' game is going to be even more important isn't it, just because of how the permutations of where Saracens are and where everyone is.”
Exeter's margin for error is thin enough that Baxter said they need to collect points from both matches, not just leave everything for next weekend. “So there's no way of saying they're not big games because you can't see any way out of it other than we've got to win at least one of them and collect points in the other to even give ourselves a chance really of being in the top four,” he said. “So whichever way we have to do it, we're going to have to do it one way or the other which is collect a number of points over two games.”
That is the part that cuts against any simple read of the table. Exeter are still in fourth, but with Leicester still ahead and Saracens close behind, Baxter does not see a route that depends on one final must-win on its own. “I don't think it's going to be a scenario where we can wait until the last game of the season and hope that it's a one-off game, I just can't see the permutations working quite like that,” he said. Exeter head to Leicester on Sunday and host Saracens next weekend, with those two results likely to decide whether Baxter's side stay in the top four or slip out of it.
