BATH director of rugby Todd Blackadder is demanding his team play "a lot smarter" after digging themselves out of a hole to beat Benetton Treviso.

The 23-0 winning margin in Pool Five of the European Champions Cup was a harsh reflection on the Italian visitors' contribution to the contest.

Bath now head to Llanelli next Friday night to face one of the tournament favourites in PRO14 champions Scarlets.

Blackadder could not fault his players' effort but said yellow cards for prop Nick Auterac and hooker Tom Dunn had made things unnecessarily difficult.

"The game was everything I expected it to be," he said. "They're not a mug side you're going to walk all over and get five points out of.

"They put us under massive set-piece pressure. I felt really proud of the guys at half-time to have dug themselves out of a hole.

"But the two yellow cards - that's 20 minutes of the game - they really hurt us and everyone had to work a lot harder. You could say that we dug deep and played for each other - but we've got to be a lot smarter."

Blackadder had plenty of praise for fly-half Josh Lewis who stepped up to cover for the injured Rhys Priestland and Freddie Burns, who is serving a three-week suspension.

Lewis kicked three penalties and converted tries by Zach Mercer and Aled Brew.

"It was a very proud moment for him and his family - and for the club too," said Blackadder. "I wasn't concerned about him going into this week. He just needed to play well and he did."

Benetton head coach Kieran Crowley lamented the officials not awarding what he felt should have been a penalty try. And he did not believe the scoreline was fair on his side, saying: "There were a series of scrums and four penalties.

"If it wasn't an Italian team, it would have been a penalty try. We're pretty disappointed with that whole aspect. We'd have gone in (at half-time) at 7-6 possibly and it would have been a completely different game.

"But what happened, happened. In the end we weren't good enough to take our opportunities in the second half."

He gave credit to his players for their effort, however.

"We couldn't have asked for any more from our boys," Crowley said. "They showed massive heart. All clubs have got injury problems but we've got a 42 per cent injury rate at the moment.

"It's massive and some of the boys are doing massive shifts. The performance out there tonight was yet another step up. I would have liked a little bit more reward, maybe not getting the win but a few points on the board would have helped.

"We've just got to get better at taking our chances - and that's something we're learning."

His side take on Toulon in Treviso next weekend.