Alesana Tuilagi grabs one of Leicester's five tries in their rout over the Saints © Getty Images

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"We have to learn from our mistakes", "we're shot to pieces" and "we got our backsides spanked"; the ignominy of getting nilled in a rugby game. Three times in the Aviva Premiership this season a team has finished the match with nothing to show on the scoreboard.

First up it was London Welsh who lost 52-0 to Exeter leaving Justin Burnell to ask his team to learn from the exercise. Then it was Harlequins' turn as they were smashed 39-0 by Saracens on their own cabbage patch resulting in Conor O'Shea admitting their confidence was "shot to pieces"; an admission followed up with an apology to their supporters.

And then there was Saturday's remarkable game at the Rec where Leicester lost 45-0 to a ruthless Bath side. Richard Cockerill's reaction? Blunt - "we got our backsides spanked". The post-mortems differ but the nadir remains the same. Over the 18 seasons of Premiership rugby, there have been 32 matches where one team was lucky to get nil - Scrum Sevens looks at a selection.

Sale 76-0 Bristol - 1997-98

At the end of the 1997-98 season, Bristol were relegated and in receivership. Then came the renaissance but prior to a rebirth comes the depths of despair. For Bristol, theirs came on November 9, 1997, when they leaked 12 tries at Heywood Road. Sale, captained by Jim Mallinder, finished in seventh but would not have had better days than the one they enjoyed on that Sunday. Tom Beim, who would go on to win two England caps on that summer's 'tour of hell', scored four tries while David Rees grabbed a hat-trick and Phil Winstanley a brace. Pat Sanderson, Kevin Ellis and Mallinder also got in on the act as the Premiership witnessed its first nilling.

Wasps 35-0 Bath - 1998-99

It was almost a year to the day that Bath had won the Heineken Cup when they trudged up the M5 to Loftus Road to face Wasps. While Wasps were gearing up for their spell of dominance in the early part of the next decade, Bath were in decline and the growing gulf was brutally exposed in front of the 9,526 supporters in the old football ground. For Wasps they enjoyed a comfortable game and scored five tries in the process. Peter Scrivener ended up scoring two with captain Mark Weedon also crossing. Martyn Wood, who would later play for Bath, also finished the game with a brace.

"I am embarrassed to be the coach and I've told the players exactly that," Bath boss Andy Robinson said in the aftermath. "We were completely out-muscled and out- thought." For Nigel Melville he joked the coaching bench of Bath "would have worried us more" than the men on the pitch.

Harlequins 0-45 Sale - 2002-03

It was the year England won the sport's biggest prize but for future World Cup-winners Will Greenwood, Dan Luger and Jason Leonard those dreams were firmly in the back of their mind as they were on the wrong end of a good old fashioned thrashing at the hands of Sale. The Sharks had their own future England hero with Jason Robinson at fullback but despite the monster scoreline, he did not get a try. Instead it was Mark Cueto, Steve Hanley, Charlie Hodgson, Chris Jones and Graeme Bond who scored with Hodgson knocking over three conversions and four penalties to help bring up their total.

"It was terrible. There is no other word for it," Harlequins coach Mark Evans said. "If we play like that we'll go down. It is as simple as that. If we play like that then we won't win another game this season."

Northampton Saints 14-0 Leicester Tigers - 2003-04

On one hand it was the perfect day for Northampton fans but rugby has a cruel way of sometimes putting a dampener on idyllic moments. As the Saints whitewashed the Tigers, rumours were circulating their coach Wayne Smith was receiving interest from the All Blacks. Eventually, he departed but this win formed part of his legacy. Prior to the match he asked Tim Rodber to address the team to get them firing but they started the match poorly with Leicester dominating the first-half but did not manage to make their possession and territory tell. In awful conditions, the Saints found another gear in the second 40 and Andrew Blowers scored alongside three penalties from Shane Drahm.

Bath found it hard going against Saracens back in 2012 © Getty Images

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Leicester Tigers 32-0 Northampton Saints - 2005-06

Those feelings of pre-season optimism did not last long for the Northampton fans when they witnessed their team nilled in the first match of the 2005-06 campaign. What made it worse was the team handing out the hammering. For the Leicester supporters they basked in the autumnal sun and saw their team run in five tries as they started the post-Martin Johnson era in the perfect way. Despite having new signing Carlos Spencer in their ranks, the Saints were powerless with Scott Hamilton, Michael Holford, Alesana Tuilagi, Dan Hipkiss and Tom Varndell all scoring. The Saints boss Budge Pountney said post-match: "It was tough. Leicester is a hard place to come to, and full credit to them."

Harlequins 49-0 Sale - 2006-07

It was a day of goodbyes at the Stoop as Andrew Mehrtens and Andre Vos called time on their Harlequins careers in front of a capacity crowd and they were given the perfect send-off as they saw their team run in six tries. While Vos did not end his Harlequins career with a try, Mehrtens bagged a try, slotted five conversions, two penalties and a drop-goal as Mike Brown and Ceri Jones grabbed braces alongside Mel Deane's try. Sale coach Philippe Saint-Andre, who rested seven frontline players, said "this is not a nice feeling" in the aftermath of their thrashing while Dean Richards was left to field questions about just why he was letting Mehrtens depart after his masterful performance.

The reaction from the Observer made grim reading for Sale fans with the newspaper reporting: "Poor injury-struck Sale looked more like chumps than champs."

Bath 0-22 Saracens - 2012-13

While Bath handed out a thrashing at the weekend they have been victims of a nilling on three occasions. Their last was on a miserable December day back in 2012 as Charlie Hodgson kicked 17 points alongside Richard Wigglesworth's try. Saracens played the conditions superbly while Bath floundered with Stephen Donald struggling from the tee. For then Bath defence coach Mike Ford, he admitted as much post-match, saying: "Fair play to them, they gave us a lesson today. It's a good lesson for us about how to play the conditions, really."