'We'll be back' vows Exeter skipper Jenkins after final loss

“We’ll be back” were Exeter skipper Dafydd Jenkins’ final words as he spoke after his side’s 26-17 Prem final loss to Northampton at Allianz Stadium.

A side who had won just four league games last season turned the form book on its head to reach this season’s showpiece against a Northampton team that have been the pacesetters all season.

“Throughout the season the boys have been amazing. I thought we were amazing today in terms of effort,” added the Wales lock who has been a key cog in this newly constructed Exeter machine.

The Chiefs led with 15 minutes left through Jenkins’ try before the imposing forward was sin-binned – and their opponents took their chance with a man’s advantage

While his director of rugby Rob Baxter refused to countenance Jenkins’ thoughts that he had let his team-mates down, the Welshman was able to reflect on a season which saw Exeter win 11 of their 18 Prem games and make the semi-finals of the European Challenge Cup.

“I think there’s been an immense amount of growth, you can see that from last season,” added Jenkins.

“I think we had to learn from last season, otherwise it was pointless, wasn’t it?

“So, we’re going to have to learn from today, we know that, but we’ve come on leaps and bounds and we just need to get that extra bit out now to lift a trophy.”

Exeter returned to Twickenham for the first time in five years as they aim for a new era of dominance in the English game.

Between 2016 and 2021 they reached every Twickenham showpiece, winning in 2017 and 2020, as they consistently ended the regular season either first or second in the table.

But a combination of Covid-19 era cutbacks and a group of star players wanting new challenges led to a regeneration of the playing squad.

A run of seventh-placed finishes followed before last season’s troubles – a club-record 79-17 loss at Gloucester in April saw long-serving coaches leave and a serious rethink at Sandy Park.

With that background Baxter says this season’s turnaround is one of his greatest achievements in his 17 years at the helm of the club.

“When you work with lads who’ve worked as hard as our guys have, it really rekindles your love for the game and has for me and it has for a lot of supporters,” he said.

“They’ve probably changed the mindset of us as a club and where we were heading more than any other group of players we’ve probably ever had in a lot of ways.

“Although we’ve had success in the past and we’ve had some forward progress, and we’ve come through from the fourth tier of rugby and got a couple of promotions, then worked very hard in the Championship, then got promoted, the reality is we kept growing there so it was easy to go with the momentum as a club and just follow it and just be part of it and grow with it.

“We had a proper slap in the face last year and that, rightly or wrongly, made a lot of people you see around the place doubt where the club is heading.

“These lads have flipped that on its head because I don’t think anybody can be more proud of what they’ve achieved this season and what they’ve done.

“That takes a lot of doing and that’s the biggest thing that’s come out of this season.”

Exeter players now ‘know’ they are ‘good enough’

The future looks bright at Sandy Park.

A takeover by American investors the Black Knight Group, which owns Premier League football side AFC Bournemouth, could be concluded before the end of the month.

Their new-look squad will pretty much stay together next season – Australian centre Len Ikitau will return home but the likes of Tom Hooper, Andrea Zambonin, Stephen Varney and Henry Slade will all return in the autumn.

And, with their new experience of a Twickenham final, Baxter feels they will be able to take the next step.

“We’ve got quite a number of players who didn’t know before they were good enough to get to a Premiership final,” he told BBC Sport.

“Well now they do know, so now they’ve got to make the decision to go and win one.

“Until today, they didn’t know they were good enough to get to a Premiership final, they didn’t know they were good enough to be competitive.

“We’ve got a group of about 15 lads out there who have not done that before, they’re the ones who are going to win us something in the future.

“They’re all here for the next two years, so that’s what will be the mark of where we go in the future.”