Lam backs Ibitoye for England’s tour
Bristol boss Pat Lam says winger Gabriel Ibitoye should be selected for England's summer tour after he topped the rankings for the most metres made and defenders beaten in the Premiership this season.
Heading into last weekend's final round against Harlequins, Ibitoye had a 50-metre advantage on Quins' Tyrone Green, with the pair the only two players to go past 1,000 metres in the league this season.
The Bears winger made an astonishing 172 metres against his former club compared to just 61 from Green to top the charts and end the season with the most defenders beaten, averaging more than 4.5 per game.
Lam said: “We challenged him around getting more involved in the game after Christmas and he's been superb. If you've got (Immanuel) Feyi-Waboso on one wing, and Gabs on the other wing, with the way England want to go they've got some serious firepower there.
“Not many people have talked about him but just look at the stats. From my rugby eye, seeing what he does and his understanding of the game on attack and defence, he creates things all the time.
“He's going to back himself. His hands are massive, he can offload and make things out of nothing. For us it's all about looking to offload the ball and moving the attack from slow to fast, and he's a big part of that. His work rate has been on another level, international level if you ask me.”
Bristol finished fifth and Lam congratulated Sale and their coach Alex Sanderson, who snuck into the play-offs with a fifth consecutive league victory, against Saracens.
Lam was satisfied with the way his team had improved after 10th and ninth-place finishes in the previous two years and is optimistic with the foundations put in place.
“Congrats to Alex and Sale,” he said. “That's a big effort what they've done, but the fact we've even been in that race after the last two seasons shows our progress.
“I think the rugby we're playing is better than we were three years ago when we topped the table. We've been the form team since January in the Premiership, it's given everyone confidence.
“It's not just the attack, we've improved so much. Our set-piece is a lot better, our defence is, and our kicking game is better.
“We finished with the top lineout of the season, we put a massive focus into our scrum in the Six Nations period and that's come really good. You don't go to Leicester and do what we did against international quality players without a great set-piece.
“So that's key, everyone thinks we run the ball but there's a lot of parts of the game where we've improved. We'll get a good break and get back into it and I think we'll probably have a smaller squad next year, but most of the guys on the field in the last game of the season will all be in for it and we've got a lot great talent coming through.”
Lam was also delighted to bounce back from the Saracens defeat and right the wrongs against Quins.
“We were deflated after Saracens,” he added. “That's one of the reasons we're not in the finals as well. It was a flat week because we hadn't lost a game since February, so we had to pick everybody up.
“We beat Quins by showing what we showed against Newcastle. They had five or six front line defenders, coming harder than Sarries were, but what we did was to run all our lines. Against Sarries we were all out of position, dropping the ball.
“To finish the season like we did, everyone's excited for next year.”
