Leicester secured their 50th successive Premiership home win as they held out against Bath in a game that saw three players sent to the sin-bin.

Bath's team director Michael Foley became the latest Premiership boss to publicly criticise a match referee while Leicester's Dean Richards preferred to keep his comments strictly for the Rugby Football Union.

"I was completely baffled by some of the decisions throughout the game, not that they were one-sided, but it's a case of not understanding them,'' said Foley, who saw Mike Catt and James Scaysbrook sent to the sin-bin.

"We had one player sent to the sin-bin from a tackle situation for supposedly throwing a punch. Then later in the game we had a player lying on the ground being punched and both players were sin-binned.

"It's baffling. We take responsibility for the lack of discipline but there were decisions which I just can't work out.''

Bath's backs coach Brian Smith added: "Mike Catt definitely made a play for the ball but it seems that the touch judge took as going for the man. The video will hopefully bring that to light but certainly we thought he was hard done by.

"Leicester paid us a bit of a compliment by throwing so much set-piece possession away.

"I thought our back three handled it well and our defence was pretty sound.

"We were particularly proud of the way they performed when their backs were to the wall.

"We know we have a courageous outfit and I think the signs are there that when we play with a bit of urgency we can score tries.

"It would be nice to start a game with that sense of urgency and that is what we are asking of the players.''

Bath have only won one of their six league games this season, plus two drawn, and Foley says that they must keep up the momentum from this game as they go into the Parker Pen Shield.

"The players are growing in confidence all the time,'' he said.

"They were more relaxed approaching this game even though it was away from home and up against a Leicester side so that must be pleasing.''

Richards accepted that Leicester had lost concentration as they allowed Bath to score two easy tries in the final five minutes of the game

"The game was a bit flat in the first half until just before half-time when Martin Corry scored the first try of the game,'' said Richards.

"We scored two tries quickly after the break but I think that we lost a point because we could have done with the bonus point for scoring four tries.

"We got the win in the end but we fell asleep a bit when we were 22-6 in front and allowed them back into the game.

Welford Road's biggest ever league attendance 16,811 saw Leicester win but Bath scored two late tries through Kevin Maggs and Mike Tindall to make it close.

Tigers forwards Martin Corry, Dorian West and Neil Back all scored to see Leicester, who had Austin Healey binned, home.