honestly united
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Posts posted by honestly united
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In terms of strength in depth, I think it is incredible how far we have come on in the last few years. Its not to long ago you would look at the subs bench and you would think to yourself, I hope no one gets injured as you didn't want someone getting on the pitch as they were no where near international standard.
I had a look at the squad from the World Cup and the following players who were in that squad have not been involved either this Scotland tour or the Lions either due to injury or just not picked,
Bryce, McInally, Dickinson, Grant, Sutherland, Welsh, Gilchrist, R.Grey, Cowan, Denton, Hidalgo-Clyne, Weir, Bennett, Vernon, Maitland
Also Strockosh and Lamont have retired since
If you are looking at our weakest positions, I would say hooker to start (as has been mentioned). We need to start developing hookers earlier, rather than converting backrows in their early 20's when they aren't good enough to get in the team as a backrow. Prop, 2nd row and wing forwards we have plenty off and no concerns, No.8 is a bit of a concern for me, Strauss is good - solid but could be improved on, Wilson can be a liability (in terms off needing a 10 minute rest during games) but is a good player, Denton is too injury prone, and dont think he suits the way we play now, Fagerson looks a player so may be the answer.
Scrum half we are sorted, 10 after Russell there is a huge drop to Horne, Jackson and Weir. Hastings is next down but untried, dont know if Kinghorn is an option, he has played their for Edinburgh, but dont know if he was good - cracking fullback prospect though
Centres we look fine as we do on the wing. At Fullback after Hogg there is no natural replacement, I thought Tonks did well against Oz, Taylor was fine vs Italy, Maitland can play there also, and Kinghorn as noted above.
The issue we have is that we are developing loads of players, but dont have the club sides to play them, so we have to ship them off to England and France, then they dont get as much time as a Squad as they have to stay with the clubs.
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TBF it is pretty much the Welsh 3rd team that's playing given the first and second choice players are all with the Lions!
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Thought Turner, Rae and Kennedy would have at least got a spot on the bench, just so they could get the experience of the international game day having made the trip out on tour. Otherwise I think we have rotated all the players well, with only Barclay and Taylor starting all 3 - albeit with taylor starting one at FB rather than centre. I think we should have enough up front to win the match, especially with 6 forwards on the bench rather than 5
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Wasn't sure if I was going to stick with this, but started watching season 3 as just about everything else I was watching has finished for the summer, and have to say the first episode was ok, but the next 2 have pretty good so looking forward to seeing where this goes now
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Cotter was the right person at the time for the role - we were an absolute shambles.
Lets not forget before Cotter we were lucky if we got one try in the entire 6N's, when he left you would back Scotland to score 2 or 3 tries against any team in the world. We had a bit of shape, a game plan and were picking up wins. I think he gave Scottish Rugby the kicking it needed and has set it on the right path.
And much the same as at Glasgow, where I think Lineen did a lot of the hardwork to turn Glasgow round, Townsend coming in will take it to the next level. Lets not get to carried away as we have only beaten a very poor Italian side and a slightly experimental Australia side but there is plenty of reason to get optimistic.
On the U20's I know we did have a tie up with London Scottish where we were loaning players to them to get game time, so I would think those not getting game time at a decent level that is the first stop. I think George Horne was down there, as was Hunter-Hill, not sure who else. But a 3rd Pro team has to be looked at soon as we dont want to be either losing players or stunting their development with lack of game time
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Having just looked at the U20's results, apart from France in the semi, we had the best result against NZ - so in my eyes that makes us unofficially the 3rd best team at U20's.
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They have said from the start the tour was all about looking at the players to see what they can do. I wouldn't be surprised to see the likes of Grigg, Allan, Rae etc who haven't featured yet to get a run out against fiji
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Exodus has gone down hill a bit recently don't seem to get as many streams, lack of hd, and a lot of buffering. Just to shows though movies still ok
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I watched he Ireland game on Facebook I think its world rugby on facebook
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Great win for Scotland
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Just need to clear, win the lineout and work the phases
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We need to clear to touch in their half rather than box kicking
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That was a dreadful clearance kick straight to foley
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What a try !!!!
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Need to get down into the Aus half, spent the whole 2nd half in our half
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He doesn't help himself Wilson. Will be a tough ask to get through the rest of the ten without conceding.
We've been helped by Foley taking an age to take the conversion think its only 7 mins left now0 -
Anyone else might have got away with it but Barnes had already singled out Wilson. The one before when he was warned for coming in at the side it looked he joined from the back foot and the maul just turned.
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Was always going to happen, Barnes had picked up Wilson a few times already, had his card marked
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What's happened to Finns headband, saw he took it off last week, and not on at all this week?
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1 hour ago, Ramagamma said:
Glad you enjoyed the original because the ScarJo version is fucking dire. I hate this term because its lazy but its 2 hours of nothing happening. I'd like to give it half a pass for being pretty but its not its just dark and dreary and outright difficult to watch. Checked the time 6 times during the screening which must be a record.Im going to watch the 2nd animated version first so will probably make things even worse...
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7 minutes ago, dogmc said:
I'm a bigger fan of Horne n jacko than you but I take your point. Finn can do stuff no one else would even attempt and in this era of highly structured defence that's priceless. He will however lose games by being daft (munster last season for one). It's a price worth paying imo. I like hornes game management n he's a very decent kicker. I think he's vastly underrated by many. Jackson will always get a backline moving if he gets quick ball (he rescued many a lost cause for Glasgow with him n cusiter at halfback) but his biggest problem is his his kicking from hand is utter gash....well that and the victorian explorer beard. In summary yeah at his best finn is properly world class ( his rinsing of Dan carter in the two European games was simply awesome) but Horne n Jackson don't give me the fear at all.....tonks tho....hmm.Having suffered through the Dan parks years jackson was a breath of fresh air when he came through, and I expected him to be the first choice 10 for years to come, however he was overtaken by Weir (the same as Weir was overtaken by Russell) and being back up at Harleguins, and only getting more than a half on 12 occasions (mainly LV and European Trophy) isn't great going. If he was playing more I would be a bit more comfortable with him playing
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1 hour ago, dogmc said:
Jackson can cover ten and is well suited to the type of game toony wants to play.I think Jackson and Horne can cover 10 but they are nowhere near the same standard as Russell or top end international class. 3 or 4 years ago they would probably be 1st choice Scotland standard, but not anymore. I think everywhere else on the pitch you take out the first choice players and there is not a huge drop in standard. At prop you take out Nel and Reid and you replace them with Fagerson and Dell, in the backrow take out Hardie, Strauss and Barclay and you replace with Watson, Wilson and Harley at centre you take out Dunbar and Jones and you can replace with Taylor and Bennett.
I wouldn't want to be going into the November tests or the 6 Nations with Russell out injured.
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Jones and Hughes have played well for Glasgow and given our first 3 choices of wingers are out, its probably the best we have.
Tonks Im not as keen on, but it was probably a toss up between him and Jackson and probably Jackson is a better shout on the bench to start.
Forwards you could make a case that some of the stronger players are on the bench in Nel, Swinson and Strauss but dont have any concerns with those starting which is a good situation to be in. I would say that Stand off is the only position that I would be concerned if Russel got injured as their is no one close to the standard to step in. Everywhere else we seem to have options that are still international class
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5th or 6th leaves us as 2nd seeds for next year.
Also one of Samoa or Argentina will play off with the loser relegated to the 2018 U20 Trophy. This years winner will be promoted to replace them, with Portugal (Europe), Japan (last years relegated side), Uruguay (hosts), Namibia (africa), Hong Kong (Asia), Fiji (Oceania) and Chile (South America). USA vs Canada qualifier is later today to see who joins them in August / September
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Rugby Union
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If there is going to be any expansion to the Pro12 either through the US / Canada or SA, we definitely need to be in their lobbying for a 3rd Pro team in Scotland.
Granted Edinburgh have been poor, but I dont think they have been whipping boy levels of poor, its more down to the fine margins, and pretty poor coaching. If you look at the pro12 it would be a big ask for any team to break into the top 6 of Glasgow, Munster, Ulster, Leinster, Scarlets and Ospreays. Add in Connaught at home are a match for anyone, and Cardiff should be a top team its about where you would expect them to be.
If you take the 35 odd guys away with Scotland / Lions, the 15 I listed from the last WC squad and others out injured there is over 50 internationals class players as a starter over 3 teams. Granted some are already playing in France & England and we maybe have to admit we cant afford to keep some in Scotland. But on top of that we have the U20's / past few years U20's / institute of sport players (im assuming the SRU pays for these guys already?), a whole host of pro club players who will never be internationals but are solid players. Add in the current foreigners and it would only take maybe an extra 10 players.
Yes it would weaken Glasgow and Edinburgh slightly to start with, but in the long run it benefits everyone.
The London Scottish thing will help short term to give some of the U20's / fringe players some game time, last season they took as many players as they could. There was a bit of a falling out though as the SRU had thought they were loaning youngsters and the club would have a backbone of experienced pros to help with their development, whereas London Scottish hardly had any players signed to start with and where hoping the SRU would bail them out.