Hepher 'excited' for new season ahead
By Mark Stevens
25/7/19
Exeter Chiefs head coach Ali Hepher says he’s been encouraged by what he has seen so far from his players during the opening weeks of their pre-season programme.
With clubs up and down the country already hard at work getting ready for the 2019/20 campaign, the Chiefs are well entrenched into their grueling schedule as they look to get themselves in fine fettle for the beginning of the new season.
It all begins in earnest on Saturday, September 21 when Devon’s finest play host to local rivals Bath in the opening round of this year’s Premiership Rugby Cup. That fixture marks the start of a four-week Cup block – which will also double up as the club’s pre-season fixtures – after which the cut and thrust of the Gallagher Premiership kicks-off with Harlequins the visitors to Sandy Park on Saturday, October 19.
Hepher, together with Director of Rugby Rob Baxter, and the remainder of the club’s team of coaches know this is the time where the foundations are set for the new season – and he says it’s imperative the Chiefs get everything in place now as they look to challenge on all fronts.
“It’s great to have the boys back in,” he said. “They all look in great nick, which shows they’ve put in some hard work in the off season, and already we’ve seen some good scores in terms of their testing. That’s great for the future and it shows we have a bit of bite about us and a bit of fight to knock on from last season.”
For a fourth successive year the Chiefs made it through to the Premiership Final at Twickenham, but as was the case 12 months previous, they were undone by rivals Saracens in an epic encounter 37-34.
Hepher admitted it was another tough defeat to take, but at the same time he also saw plenty of positives in the display to give him plenty of reason to be cheerful ahead of the upcoming season.
“In a sense, I was probably more pleased with the performance than I was all with probably all the other finals,” he said. “Our levels of performance were high, we put them under a lot of pressure and we did a lot of good stuff within the game. Equally, they are a quality side, who took their opportunities to get back into the game.
“When we looked at it back, we did make some errors along the way in that game and ultimately those are the key elements as to whether you win or lose.”
Refreshed and recharged, however, Hepher cannot wait for the new season to fire back into action.
“I was excited to get back into this season,” he said. “Having reviewed it all, you could see the quality was there from our part. Also, a critical mass of the squad are still relatively young and in their mid-20s, so we feel we have a lot of growth in this group, which we are all very excited about.”
Although a number of the Chiefs squad are likely to be missing for the start of the season due to the Rugby World Cup, Hepher is backing those back here in the Westcountry to deliver on all fronts.
“Right now, we’re not sure who will or won’t be here,” continued Hepher. “Equally, it offers opportunities to others within the group to impress, initially in the Premiership Cup, then in the Premiership itself. For every club it throws up a different dynamic, so we’ll ask the guys to get immersed in it, get their hands dirty, and look to get after things from there.”
That means using the current pre-season as the building blocks to lay a solid foundation for the months ahead.
“Personally, I used to love pre-season,” added Hepher. “The key to it is in your mindset. If you go in thinking it’s going to be hard and all that, then you’re probably going to drag yourself down. The important thing is to look forward to it, enjoy the challenge of it, and look to come in each day and be better than you were the day before.
“Pre-season is going to be tough, it always is, but so will the season itself. What you have to do is keep things simple because you can’t influence the start right now. What you can influence is ourselves today. Let’s be better today than we were yesterday and keep progressing like that.”