Steve Meehan believes Bath can take pride in their 15-13 Heineken Cup loss to Stade Francais.
Bath boss unhappy with state of pitch
Bath head coach Steve Meehan was keen to take the positives from his side's display despite suffering a 15-13 loss to Stade Francais in the Heineken Cup.
The English club had a slim mathematical chance of progressing from Pool Four but saw their European hopes officially ended in treacherous conditions in Paris.
The hosts looked to have put the game beyond doubt in the first half as a brace of tries from Julien Arias sent them into a commanding 12-point lead.
But Bath persevered and, aided by a Lionel Beauxis howler, fought back to within two by the end of the contest.
After the match, Meehan criticised how poorly the Stade Jean Bouin pitch stood up to the rain, but also admitted that Bath's performance also fell short at times.
Conditions
"It came down to the conditions and, from time to time, our inaccuracies," he said.
"But I was happy with the effort and proud of the guys. It was a terrific performance. At one stage, it was 15-3 and we got it back to 15-13.
"We are desperately disappointed that we couldn't go on further. It was a terrific effort considering we were playing on a cabbage patch."
He added: "The pitch didn't impress too many guys that were out there today. It's something Stade Francais must look at and improve.
"People have a go at our patch at The Rec but our field would have stood up to the test better than that."
Bath have endured a frustrating season so far, lying 10th in the Guinness Premiership and having now been dumped out of Europe.
Ambitions
But Meehan is eying a domestic rally in the second half of the campaign, saying that Heineken Cup qualification through league position is still well within his sights.
"We want to make sure we are in next season's Heineken Cup," the Australian added.
"We want to qualify through the Guinness Premiership to do that. That will mean finishing in the top half and we have an opportunity to do that, with the table being tight.
"Our future is in our hands. In the last six weeks, our performances have been terrific and we can take confidence out of this game today. We didn't stop - we were always trying.
"But it's very disappointing we haven't qualified from our group, considering we made the quarter-finals last year."
