Baxter keeping his eyes peeled

By Howard Lloyd

Rob Baxter has not ruled out adding to his Exeter Chiefs squad should anyone stand out during the World Cup.

The head coach declared his summer business complete with the signing of winger James Short from London Irish in July, although he admitted that he might still recruit throughout the season should the right player become available.

And Baxter says that with a number of players expected to be open to moves following the World Cup – which concludes on October 31 – he is keeping his eyes peeled for any standout performers.

"We're probably similar to a few Premiership clubs in that we are looking at potential options of players post-World Cup," he said.

"The truth is that, at this stage, some of the post-World Cup players are still making their minds up on what they're going to do, and it also changes about when they become available due to who makes it through pool stages and when knockout happens – that can affect contract offers.

"It is relatively complex, but we're also watching games that are being played at the moment to see who's playing well.

"We're in that nice position where we don't have to sign anybody, and we'll be comfortable going in where we are, especially now that we've signed James Short (pictured). That means we have filled the back-three slot that was spare, but we're ready to add someone if the right player becomes available."

As for the players Baxter currently has at his disposal, they return to training this Monday following a week off.

The decision to give the players some extra rest and recuperation came after Baxter and his fellow coaches declared themselves pleased with the progress of their training and conditioning work, as well as their performances thus far in the Westcountry Challenge Cup.

Exeter have won both games in the competition so far, using much of their first-team squad to defeat Gloucester in the opening match before using many of their fringe players to defeat Bath a little over a week ago.

Baxter plans to start streamlining his squad for the Premiership curtain-raiser against Bath on October 17, but he admits that the strong performances from so many players have made that a difficult task.

"There's no doubt that we're going to move to be stronger now as time goes by," he said. "We are going to look to pick a more settled side and start building towards that first Premiership game.

"What's going to be important over the next couple of weeks is to get some decent game time into the guys who we feel will be in the 25 or 26 – players who will be involved in that first game and get them well prepared and game-ready with that match fitness so they can do 80 minutes at Premiership level.

"At the moment the difficult thing is we've got a lot of players who have played well in the last two games. We have to now start locking it down a bit harder, we've done a detailed analysis of the first two games so I think we have a good idea of where everyone is at the moment."