World Cup will benefit Bath's Heineken dream

Bath have been without Lewis Moody, Lee Mears, David Wilson and Matt Banahan, plus new signings Francois Louw, Anthony Perenise and Stephen Donald, for most of the season but they should all be available for the Heineken Cup opener against Glasgow a week on Sunday.

And as well as receiving a huge boost from the return of his big names, McGeechan is convinced he now has a far stronger squad than he did this time last year thanks to the opportunities the World Cup has afforded fringe members of the set up.

"We've had a huge advantage with missing some of the World Cup players in that we've had a squad together since June that's been a mixture of established club players and senior academy players and they've really come through," said McGeechan, whose men also face Heineken Cup holders Leinster and French Top 14 finalists Montpellier in Pool 3.

"We've had 13 academy players playing in the first eight games of the season. That's been a huge bonus for us because it's accelerated their progress.

"At the moment, we're integrating the World Cup players back in. That's an interesting challenge and it's different to when you've got a pre season with them. You've usually got eight or nine games with them under your belt before the Heineken Cup so, in that respect, it will be a little bit different."

Arguably the highest-profile signing to be making his Heineken Cup debut this season is All Black fly-half Donald.

The former Chiefs pivot kicked the winning penalty in New Zealand's World Cup Final win over France and McGeechan is delighted to now have him in situ at The Rec.

"We're very excited to have Stephen on board. It's nice to have a current World Cup winner as part of the squad - the World Cup seemed to be made for him!" added McGeechan, who also has former Leicester Tiger Sam Vesty and youngsters Sam Heathcote and Paul Roberts competing for the No10 shirt.

"He's all registered and ready to go. We'll have a week to integrate him into the Club and how we want to play and we'll take it from there.

"Hopefully the younger players will benefit from Stephen being around as well but you need that experience in the key positions. If you've only got one player there, you're always vulnerable.

"You need that depth of experienced players and decision makers that you can move in and out. I don't want Stephen Donald to play 35 games a season, either. Good teams are able to mix and match a little bit in key positions and I would hope that we have the ability to do that."

Bath's last two Heineken Cup adventures have been disappointing affairs as slow starts derailed their chances of progression before the New Year.

McGeechan believes the standard of rugby is making reaching the quarter-final stages a more difficult task season by season but he feels the 1998 champions are on the right track this time around.

"You've got to keep raising the level. The tournament challenges you because of the quality of the teams you play.

"You've got to raise the bar and, generally, if you do well in Europe, it's because you've got players who will take responsibility and because you've got natural leaders throughout the team. Teams that win the competition have got that sort of structure.

"We've had a few changes here. We've been trying to evolve our game going back to about last Christmas in terms of how we train, how we look at games and how we want to be. That's still evolving. We're not there yet and we're not the finished article.

"If we can be really good with our core tactical work, then eventually we'll get a good variety of performance out of that. We're still working towards that goal and as a group we know that we've still got to keep pushing ourselves."