Rugby Union

[Bully Wee Villa]

It sounds like the referee told him to hurry up as well? Seems a bit unfair, especially as he had twenty seconds spare.

It might seem that two points were immaterial in the end, but I feel that miss negated the momentum we had built up with the try and gave France a psychological boost.

[John Lambies Doos]

Tad confused. We are more than 1 full ranking point ahead of the argies. How can defeat to England and Wales who are both over a ranking point ahead of us result in us falling below argies?

[GAD]

Just seen the injury update. Not looking good. Can see us missing Dunbar, Brown, Barclay, Hardie, Laidlaw and Strauss for the Wales game. Need to wrap the rest in cotton wool. Doubt many players will be getting released to their clubs this weekend.

[dogmc]

Just seen the injury update. Not looking good. Can see us missing Dunbar, Brown, Barclay, Hardie, Laidlaw and Strauss for the Wales game. Need to wrap the rest in cotton wool. Doubt many players will be getting released to their clubs this weekend.

Not great but they are positions that we have some strength in depth. I'd like to see Welsh n Reid starting against Wales. Dell n Fagerson are better scrummaggers than last two games would suggest but dell can't do anything about both opponents angling in illegally. Refs have already made their mind about about our front row so we will need to make changes. Beat Wales n Italy it will have been a decent season. Lose to Wales it will be pretty mediocre and if we also failed to beat Italy then cotter would only really have a lucky rwc draw to show for his time in charge. We have defo got injury issues but over last 3 seasons we have had enough good players to be getting better results consistently than we have.

[GAD]

4 minutes ago, dogmc said:

Not great but they are positions that we have some strength in depth. I'd like to see Welsh n Reid starting against Wales. Dell n Fagerson are better scrummaggers than last two games would suggest but dell can't do anything about both opponents angling in illegally. Refs have already made their mind about about our front row so we will need to make changes. Beat Wales n Italy it will have been a decent season. Lose to Wales it will be pretty mediocre and if we also failed to beat Italy then cotter would only really have a lucky rwc draw to show for his time in charge. We have defo got injury issues but over last 3 seasons we have had enough good players to be getting better results consistently than we have.

Do you not think Dunbar would be a huge miss? We have a lot of centres, but no other centre that can do Dunbar's job as far as I can see. Hopefully Wilson is back for the Wales game. He was a massive miss on Sunday.

[honestly united]

I think it shows how far this team has come that people are disappointed that we were drawing with France in Paris with 10 minutes to go, and lost as they kicked 2 late penalties. It hurts as the game was their for the taking, but this is the best French team in quite a few years, and only lost to England the week before due to a late try. Its 18 years since we won the last 5 nations, and in that time all we have had to celebrate is the 3 calcutta cup wins and avoiding the wooden spoon.

I might be biased but i thought again this weekend the Scotland match was the best as at least both teams were trying to win the match rather than the England Wales trying to avoid losing. I dont think Peyper was any worse than the other refs we've had. I just dont think Scotland ever do a good job of playing to what the ref will let you get away with. 

We got hammered in the scrum and if we are not going to sort if we are going to struggle. I can see what he is doing with Dell and Fagerson as obviously the are talented young props and in a few years this experience is going to have benefited them and the team in general as they will be much better for it, but i think they would have been better rotating the props after last week. However Cotter has gone completely the other way with Price. If he had been given more than just 10 minutes against Georgia in the Autumn (dont think he got any game time in Japan either) he maybe wouldn't have given away that penalty and a bit more experience would have helped against France. I dont think it was just Laidlaw going off that was the issue, it was losing Barclay as well. Its a bit harder being 3rd choice captain trying to get in the ear of the ref.

Also I dont know if Russell was maybe feeling the pressure a bit in the 2nd half, there is a lot of praise being thrown his way, and I wonder if he was feeling the onus was on him to create something

[dogmc]

Do you not think Dunbar would be a huge miss? We have a lot of centres, but no other centre that can do Dunbar's job as far as I can see. Hopefully Wilson is back for the Wales game. He was a massive miss on Sunday.

Dunbar is a loss but with bennett and Taylor in reserve we can cope with it a lot better than we have with nel n dickinson being out. Price has been hammered for his push but it was fairly harsh of the ref to reverse it and after he'd allowed numerous high tackles n blocking off the ball by French . I also don't think losing laidlaw changed that much. We were as much under the pump with laidlaw as without. Wilson was missed though I thought strauss n Watson were pretty good again. I've actually been quite impressed with swinson when he's come on in back row. Don't recall seeing him doing that for Glasgow but he's in great form just now. Must be very very close between him n ritchie for starting slot.

[John Lambies Doos]

Dunbar is a loss but with bennett and Taylor in reserve we can cope with it a lot better than we have with nel n dickinson being out. Price has been hammered for his push but it was fairly harsh of the ref to reverse it and after he'd allowed numerous high tackles n blocking off the ball by French . I also don't think losing laidlaw changed that much. We were as much under the pump with laidlaw as without. Wilson was missed though I thought strauss n Watson were pretty good again. I've actually been quite impressed with swinson when he's come on in back row. Don't recall seeing him doing that for Glasgow but he's in great form just now. Must be very very close between him n ritchie for starting slot.

Re. Swinson agree about his position, but when playing with Glasgow albeit in different position he really is an exciting ball carrier.

Does anyone else think that Ryan Wilson looks like Stan Wawrinka?

[dogmc]

Re. Swinson agree about his position, but when playing with Glasgow albeit in different position he really is an exciting ball carrier.

Does anyone else think that Ryan Wilson looks like Stan Wawrinka?

Always liked swinson but his form last few weeks has been something else.

[flyingscot]

21 hours ago, John Lambies Doos said:

Tad confused. We are more than 1 full ranking point ahead of the argies. How can defeat to England and Wales who are both over a ranking point ahead of us result in us falling below argies?

Because of the way it works with home advantage. When you have home advantage you have +3 points added to your ranking to compensate. This handicaps home sides and gives us a ranking of 83.90 ahead of Wales 82.44. Therefore Wales are beating a 'higher ranked team'. 

[flyingscot]

Only watched it in pub with no sound but my take-

We were correct in taking the conversion quickly- in France with French TV / stadium edit looking at anything not clear cut! Mistake was being so close to the posts means the French centre would have been on him if he tried to pick it up. That said that would be less embarrassing. 

I don't think Price did anything that bad in the game. Thought he did well overall. The penalty was daft but I felt he was unlucky there. I've been banging on for years that it is a mistake not to bleed another scrum half at 60/70mins in internationals- or indeed not start Price in games such as Georgia to give experience at that level to him. The fact he stepped in at international level via France in Paris, when we had lost multiple captains and leaders and didn't do badly is a credit to him. 

Russell is continually up and down at Glasgow. Getting consistency is his next development at 10. Hogg is truely world class 15. 

Scrum is an issue but we lack experience all round in front row. Don't think it is as bad as people are making out as a lot is inexperience of how to manage a weaker scrum at international level. Nell is excellent at that. If Dickinson manages back then we will take an immediate step forward. Our worst area is under the high ball and not being able to catch a bloody restart!

I love the fact the 6 Nations gets people who don't usually watch rugby into it, but over the weekend some of the social media comments (and indeed MSM!) around a defeat in Paris are over the top and in other instances wrong! 

[PrestersKTID]

Our scrum was overpowered far too easily. At the world cup it was pretty steady with Nel and Dickinson but obviously they are both out. What ever happened to Ryan Grant? Was on last lions tour.

Our attacking threat is the best it's been for years. When people like Visser, Matt Scott and Bennett aren't starting you see there's decent depth in the backs. 

[honestly united]

10 minutes ago, PrestersKTID said:

Our scrum was overpowered far too easily. At the world cup it was pretty steady with Nel and Dickinson but obviously they are both out. What ever happened to Ryan Grant? Was on last lions tour.

Our attacking threat is the best it's been for years. When people like Visser, Matt Scott and Bennett aren't starting you see there's decent depth in the backs. 

Grant has dropped down the pecking order ever since the fancy dress take away incident, but to be fair he has had a huge drop in form - has been packed of to Worcester as not getting any game time at Glasgow.

Looking at the games over the last year, obviously Nel and Dickinson were first choice in the 6 nations and summer tour, but Sutherland and Low seemed to be the preferred back ups with Fagerson and Reid also being involved, however from the Autumn onwards Dell and Fagerson have been the first choice with Low and Allan being backups in the autumn. Bergman looked ok vs France, Low isn't getting much game time at Exeter and Sutherland's injured.

My biggest concern injury wise for Wales is Dunbar - we have Taylor and Scott who can both play there, but I think Dunbar is a very different player from both of those, he is much stronger defensively, which we will need against the crash ball of Wales, but also adds something to the attack.

[dogmc]

Reid strauss and bennett confirmed as leaving Glasgow at end of season.

[dogmc]

Grant has dropped down the pecking order ever since the fancy dress take away incident, but to be fair he has had a huge drop in form - has been packed of to Worcester as not getting any game time at Glasgow.
Looking at the games over the last year, obviously Nel and Dickinson were first choice in the 6 nations and summer tour, but Sutherland and Low seemed to be the preferred back ups with Fagerson and Reid also being involved, however from the Autumn onwards Dell and Fagerson have been the first choice with Low and Allan being backups in the autumn. Bergman looked ok vs France, Low isn't getting much game time at Exeter and Sutherland's injured.
My biggest concern injury wise for Wales is Dunbar - we have Taylor and Scott who can both play there, but I think Dunbar is a very different player from both of those, he is much stronger defensively, which we will need against the crash ball of Wales, but also adds something to the attack.

Very surprised Welsh hasn't been drafted in. Arguably our best scrummaging tight head after nel. If dickinson is fit he should be back in ASAP.

[John Lambies Doos]

Because of the way it works with home advantage. When you have home advantage you have +3 points added to your ranking to compensate. This handicaps home sides and gives us a ranking of 83.90 ahead of Wales 82.44. Therefore Wales are beating a 'higher ranked team'. 

So why did we drop so much by getting beat by France. With 3 added to them pre game, they would have been higher ranked than us. Result was that they went above us and we plummeted.
So it's defiinite. Lose to Wales and we are 9th??

[ajwffc]

Reid strauss and bennett confirmed as leaving Glasgow at end of season.

With Bennett moving to Edinburgh

[dogmc]

With Bennett moving to Edinburgh

Yep great business for embra

[GAD]

3 hours ago, dogmc said:

Reid strauss and bennett confirmed as leaving Glasgow at end of season.

I guess Reid and Strauss are away to England or France. I guess both need to make their money now, and Glasgow are carrying far to many international players just now. I guess the money will now be used to bolster up the squad with some better imports and possibly project players.

[dogmc]

I guess Reid and Strauss are away to England or France. I guess both need to make their money now, and Glasgow are carrying far to many international players just now. I guess the money will now be used to bolster up the squad with some better imports and possibly project players.

Yep. Think we are reaching a point where we have young guys coming through so they need a platform to play. We need cover for 6n n autumn so losing experience is tough because I think some of the young guys are barely able to step up to Pro12 just yet. In past seasons there were guys like niko Leone strauss himself n dth who could nurse young guys through 6n games. It's easier for Welsh n irish because with 4 teams each there's generally less disruption from each team yet we don't yet have enough top players to fill a 3rd pro team. Equally we don't wanna recruit too many mercenaries as that held embra back for a few seasons. Eta might be good to have a few of our top guys in England n France for experience and also it might see slightly less strain on the Pro12 squads.