Premiership: Bristol Bears 14-50 Exeter Chiefs - Visitors go top with seven-try haul

Olly Woodburn scores the first of his two tries against Bristol

Seven-try Exeter Chiefs emphatically beat Bristol Bears 50-14 at Ashton Gate to move to second in the Premiership table.

Toby Fricker opened the scoring with a try for the home side, but Jack Nowell and Olly Woodburn doubles gave the Chiefs a 24-point lead.

Will Capon pulled a try back before a Luke Cowen-Dickie interception pushed the gap back out.

Ruben van Heerden and Richard Capstick added a try each as Exeter dominated.

Exeter, who would have gone top of the table had it not been for their victory over Worcester being expunged after the Warriors were suspended for the rest of the season and relegated, had only won on the road once since February prior to kick-off and they conceded two early penalties to begin the match as they were pinned inside their own half.

As Bristol ticked through the phases to draw the Chiefs in narrow, a cross-field kick from Callum Sheedy picked out Fricker - on his return from injury - on the right and the winger had a clear run to the line.

A Joe Simmonds penalty put Exeter on the board, but when Ellis Genge was sent to the sin-bin for head contact in a tackle, they were all but handed two tries as gaps opened in Bristol's defensive line.

Two long balls over the top found first Nowell on the right and then Woodburn on the left, with the latter stepping inside to fool the defence and impressively touch down in the corner.

Bristol were not without opportunities in the first half but they just could not convert them, as Joe Joyce made a long run only to find little support and then Harry Randall was denied on the line.

Just after the break, Harry Williams saw a try ruled out by the officials for being held up and Henry Slade almost darted over through a gap.

Woodburn did not miss, however, at Exeter's third time of asking, acrobatically diving into the corner to score before Nowell followed suit with his second try five minutes later to secure the bonus point.

Capon's try from the mauling pack suggested Bristol were not yet down and out, but Cowen-Dickie immediately intercepted a pass to stretch Exeter's advantage to 24 again as the stunned home players could only watch him walk under the posts.

Van Heerden made it six tries from close range, and with Piers O'Conor shown a yellow card for a tackle in the air, Capstick made it a half-century score as Bristol suffered a second consecutive defeat.

Bristol director of rugby Pat Lam told BBC Radio Bristol:

"Not ideal. We started well and ultimately we missed a few opportunities that first half and [lost our] discipline. Once we ended up with 14 men, against Exeter they'll rumble in there.

"There's a lot of work we've got to do on defence and at 17-7 just before half-time ideally we would have scored, we had a few chances we didn't take and that's important.

"And then 17-7 [to start the second half] we've just got to fire a shot at kick-off and we lose the ball, we spend a lot of time defending.

"We didn't get much change out of our penalties at the scrums and then they just had a lot of time. We got camped in this place and they came strong."

Exeter head coach Ali Hepher said:

"I asked the boys for a special performance and I knew they were mentally right and I couldn't be more pleased with the whole 23 of them.

"This season, we've built up good leads but have let sides back into it. There was none of that tonight as we kept working all the time.

"Big swings often take place around the half-time interval so we dug in very well and scrapped in the final five minutes of that first half to keep our line intact.

"In our game against Harlequins we switched off and became sloppy, but we managed to handle really well tonight in the conditions and can get a lot better than that."

Bristol: Piutau, Fricker, O'Conor, Bedlow, Lane, Sheedy, Randall; Genge, Capon, Sinckler, Hawkins, Joyce, Vui, Heenan (c), Bradbury.

Replacements: Kerr, Woolmore, Lahiff, Holmes, Thomas, Whiteley, MacGinty, Bates.

Sin-bin: Ellis Genge (17), O'Conor (70).

Exeter: Hogg, Nowell, Slade, O'Loughlin, Woodburn, Simmonds, Maunder; Hepburn, Yeandle (c), Williams, Kirsten, J Gray, Vermeulen, Tshiunza, Capstick.

Replacements: Cowan-Dickie, Iosefa-Scott, Schickerling, Van Heerden, Ewers, Maunder, Skinner, Kata.

Referee: Christophe Ridley.

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