You notice a lot of talk about run-ins in sport at this time of year – and it's fair to say we're in the thick of one in the Aviva Premiership right now.
It's very much the time of the season where you want to get yourself into a position of having your destiny in your own hands.
In our first season, two years ago, we made sure our top-flight status was safe but then didn't really have a lot to play for. We knew we weren't going to be top six.
Whereas this time last year we were right in amongst it, in the top five and going for the top four, and this year again we know that if we win our remaining games then hopefully we'll finish in the top six.
The Premiership's run-in really feels like it's under way with about five or six games of the season left, once the Six Nations is over and teams are back to full strength. At that stage the points start running out and you know what you have left to do with your remaining matches.
We hit back from our defeat at Saracens with a couple of good wins against Welsh and Quins and, while we lost against Leicester, we've still got three games to get it right.
What's interesting at this stage of the season is how the momentum can shift really quickly between the teams vying for those top positions. While we're still in eighth, we're only really a few points off sixth place, plus two of our three games are against teams above us.
Wasps, that will be huge, and Irish this weekend who are playing some good rugby, and then Gloucester as well, who are going to be chasing fourth. It just seems like everyone has so much to play for right now.
The play-offs definitely help to add to the excitement, and certainly they give a lot more teams something to play for at this end of the season.
It took a few years to get used to the system, but now everyone's in the same boat we've just got used to it. In a way the play-offs do take a little of the pressure off, because if you lose a game or two it doesn't stop you from winning the championship.
I think in the next two to four years we might find ourselves really involved in the fight for those top-four places. We had a go last year, and this season we've had our first foray into the Heineken Cup, but getting used to all these new experiences improves our chances of getting into those positions. Those teams who seem to be there or thereabouts every year certainly have an advantage – so we have to aspire to that.
One person who will make sure that we do is Rob Baxter, and it was great to see him getting recognition by the England set-up last week.
It's great for both him personally and the other coaches at Chiefs. I think he'll learn a fair bit from the experience of touring with the England side in the sense of how things are done at that level.
There are constraints at Premiership level that you just don't get with England. He'll relish the amount of equipment you get to use, techniques they use, those kinds of things. Certainly there are no corners cut in the national set-up.
And then Rob can perhaps bring that back and see how things could perhaps be better done here.
You learn a lot from different players, and from seeing how the other teams are coached. He is a very good coach, but this may give him a more rounded experience. And it gives some kudos to the other coaches at Exeter.
I think the way we play at Chiefs makes us one of the most attacking and attractive teams in the Premiership, which is down to the coaches.
We try and play, and keep the ball in hand, as much as we can, and that's really down to Rob and Ali, and I've noticed a lot of teams who seem to be copying how we play.
I was watching Gloucester against Quins game and a lot of the rugby Gloucester were playing you could recognise in the way we play. They were throwing the ball around on their own try line and it was a great game of rugby. So I hope perhaps Rob can bring some of that to the England set-up.
For me, it's out of my hands really. I've done as much as I can getting back fit, so I guess I'll just have to wait and see.
