ENGLISH rugby union's cup and league having been precariously won, so it is a form of masochism that has driven Bath to tonight's rugby league match against Wigan at Maine Road.

A sum close to Pounds 400,000 will pay a few bills, though, so a team who at times appeared to be on their collective last legs against Leicester at Twickenham last Saturday will just have to find a new pair. As Brian Ashton, their coach accepts, his players could have done with months of preparation aimed at this one event.

Instead they have had a few days, and if anyone knows the inadequacy of this it is Ashton who happens to be a Wigan man whose father Albert was on Wigan's books at the outbreak of World War II. Even now Ashton junior, who will become Bath's first full-time coach in July, (48) reckons he has watched more rugby league than rugby union during his spectating life.

Whatever your view of the merits of tonight's 13-a-side match or the 15- a-side return at Twickenham on March 25th, they are incontrovertibly historic occasions after 101 years of league/union enmity. Yet until last weekend Bath had had to treat this first leg as an inconvenient intrusion while they set about regaining the championship and retaining the cup.

Bearing in mind that Wigan are themselves champions, this is hopelessly inadequate even though Ashton habitually uses league drills in his training for union.

"Given a reasonable amount of time to prepare, we would have been able to do full credit to ourselves," Ashton said. "But it's asking a hell of a lot even from as dedicated and talented a bunch as we have to play the first game of rugby league in their lives against Wigan under these circumstances. Ideally we would have liked a two or three-week break in order to get ready in a more thorough and relaxed manner."

The coach's consolation is his hope that at Twickenham Wigan will find mastery of rugby union's mysteries - scrum, line-out, ruck and maul - at least as difficult as Bath find those of rugby league. But it is a hope and certainly not an expectation. Ashton ventures that in a league context his players handling and tackling will stand up to scrutiny and is more concerned at how well they will sustain an unfamiliar defensive organisation.

"One thing that has been pointed out to us is that if Wigan spot a player out of place - for example a prop marking a centre - then they are ready to exploit that immediately. It isn't easy because in rugby union you fill the space that's nearest to you and other players spread out away from there."

Of equal concern is the nonstop action of rugby league, the vastly longer period in which the ball is in play and the correspondingly shorter period in which Bath will be allowed to draw breath.

"But handling and tackling might ultimately depend on something else: the fatigue factor. Rugby league players are used to having the ball in play for 60-65 minutes whereas if we get 30-35 it's considered a substantial period. On the other hand, there's not the intensive scrummaging or driving mauls or the impact in rucks, and in training the front-five forwards have seemed a lot livelier about the field."

Clearly these cross-code encounters are made for a rugby man such as Ashton, who played nothing but league at junior school in Wigan but then attended Royal Grammar School, Lancaster, where the only rugby was union.

"We will have to live off our wits but it may be we will pose Wigan's defence problems precisely because we are a rugby union team who have an unfamiliar approach. Technically, rugby union is a much more complicated game although we've found rugby league isn't as simple as you might think from standing watching it."

These fixtures are a two-off which might not be repeated unless, or until, the codes coalesce, and in Ashton's view it is more likely to be until than unless.

Bath have scrum-half Ian Sanders as hooker while Jonathan Callard, normally a full-back, will operate at scrum-half. The visitors introduce Adam Vander to big-occasion rugby. The flanker will prop the scrum.

Wigan plan to field their strongest available side, which will include Martin Offiah. Offiah, one of Wigan's former rugby union stars, has not played for more than a month after breaking a small bone in his back during his side's Super League defeat at St Helens on Good Friday. Also in the Wigan side are former All Black Va'aiga Tuigamala and former Welsh international Scott Quinnell.

Bookmakers William Hill are not even offering a price on a Wigan victory. Bath are 12 to 1 to win and a draw is 33 to 1.