Exeter boss Rob Baxter has hailed the impact of Immanuel Feyi-Waboso after his side’s Champions Cup win over Bath.
The 21-year-old England winger had a hand in the Chiefs’ two second-half tries as they overcame a 12-7 half-time deficit to beat their West Country rivals 21-15 and make the last eight.
“He’s the closest replacement to a Jack Nowell that we probably could have got,” Baxter told BBC Radio Devon.
“He’s just gets you metres out of nowhere and is getting better at it.”
Exeter travel to France to take on Antoine Dupont’s Toulouse in the Champions Cup quarter-finals on Sunday, after the five-time winners beat Racing 92 in the last 16.
Feyi-Waboso moved to Exeter after Wasps went bust last season and has had a breakout campaign at the club.
The former Wales youngster opted to play for England and featured in four of his country’s five Six Nations games earlier this year.
“He’s still learning how to use those talents that he’s got but he just gets you some momentum,” added Baxter.
“At least two of our tries came from just momentum that he gained, almost on his own at times, when he probably didn’t deserve to get momentum.
“I think that kind of shows his value and we’ve also got to remember that we’ve probably missed a couple of those type of players – Tommy Wyatt was doing very similar earlier in the season.
“When we get them on the ball and we create those little bits of momentum, it makes everything else flow so much better and we get so much more movement in the game.”
The victory came a week after a chastening 41-5 loss at Sale which saw the Chiefs miss the chance to return to the Premiership’s top four – having also lost heavily at Saracens in their last league game before the Six Nations.
“Our pack of forwards stood up today,” added Baxter
“[In] the two away games we got dominated up front but our scrum held up today, our line-out was very good.
“I thought Christ Tshiunza, particularly on opposition line-out in very difficult conditions to throw, created some problems and that helped us break up Bath’s` possession flow.
“Sometimes you’ve got to hand it over and go ‘well done guys, you’ve stood up in the wind and you’ve fought and it was a great game of rugby for you to have been involved in’.”