Europe put on the backburner

Rob Baxter believes Exeter Chiefs face a 'humdinger' of a European quarter-final against Newcastle - but says they will forget about that for now.

The Chiefs' 45-3 win against Bayonne in their final European Challenge Cup group game set them up with a home date with the Falcons in the last eight in early April.

Dean Richards' men beat Exeter 29-24 at Kingston Park in October and won four of their six games in Pool Three to go through as one of the best three runners-up.

Newcastle also travel to Sandy Park on February 14 for a league game, and Baxter is more concerned with how they come through the next two LV= Cup fixtures to hit the ground running when they return to the Aviva Premiership.

Baxter said: “We’ll put the European stuff to bed now for a few weeks, we’ve two important weeks coming up now for a few reasons – we want to get some guys up and running, it will be a changed-up team, we’ve got to get some bodies back fit and refreshed because we’ve got a very important group of Premiership games coming up.

“Obviously the important thing is that we’re playing at home. Newcastle is going to be a tough fixture for us because we’ve not beaten them this season, they played very well against us and they’re an improving team.

“It’s going to be a very difficult fixture because, like ourselves, they’ll go full-on into the fixture, they’re not in any danger of relegation and it’s a great competition for them to be involved in.

“It will be a humdinger of a game, I’m certain of that, but we’ve got to put it on the backburner and focus on the Premiership, which is the really important competition for us.”

Exeter travel to play Newport Gwent Dragons this Sunday before they end their LV= Cup pool stage programme at Saracens seven days later.