Nice kick Vai
Blues
Match thread
Drua
@Tim said in Blues v Drua:
@Bones Yeah, tall and skinny but fast.
Watching him glide up midfield was crazy, bit Joe Rok.
@Steven-Harris said in Blues v Drua:
Handling in perfect conditions has been very poor
Looked pretty good when Vai spun the ball after his try.
@KiwiMurph said in Blues v Drua:
Everything Wrampling does is loose
More impressed by Che Clark
Che Clark has been impressive since coming on.
@Frank said in Blues v Drua:
How Torian Barnes going? Always love the new shiny thing.
Looked busy, some bruising runs and nice handling early on.
BB too slow to catch up with his tap for an attempted intercept is a lovely summary of where he's at.
Nice finish by Clarke.
Impressive performance by the Blues loose forwards. Not so much the locks.
Also unimpressed by Spencer's debut at fullback too. Especially his donkey effort that lead to the Drua's second try.
@antipodean yeah he was pretty meh to start, but grew into it I thought and ended up at least at the same level as Forbes. Worth persevering.
Second half was very impressive. Humidity clearly making the ball slippery, lot of unusual drops.
Two howlers from Spencer, but plenty of positives and after my complaints last week about passing quality in NZ, he had two try assists with a perfect spiral pass in front of the player. One left, one right. Seriously quick too.
@antipodean said in Blues v Drua:
Nice finish by Clarke.
Impressive performance by the Blues loose forwards. Not so much the locks.
Also unimpressed by Spencer's debut at fullback too. Especially his donkey effort that lead to the Drua's second try.
Akhi, Segner, Darry, Beehre and Wrampling led the defence against a pretty brutal attack. We scored some over those classic maul tries that the Drua struggle against. What about the locks didn't you like?
@brodean said in Blues v Drua:
@antipodean said in Blues v Drua:
Nice finish by Clarke.
Impressive performance by the Blues loose forwards. Not so much the locks.
Also unimpressed by Spencer's debut at fullback too. Especially his donkey effort that lead to the Drua's second try.
Akhi, Segner, Darry, Beehre and Wrampling led the defence against a pretty brutal attack. We scored some over those classic maul tries that the Drua struggle against. What about the locks didn't you like?
The amount of ball they dropped or lost with inaccurate carries.
@Bones said in Blues v Drua:
@antipodean yeah he was pretty meh to start, but grew into it I thought and ended up at least at the same level as Forbes. Worth persevering.
Agree he's worth persevering with, but Forbes is a low bar these days.
@antipodean said in Blues v Drua:
@brodean said in Blues v Drua:
@antipodean said in Blues v Drua:
Nice finish by Clarke.
Impressive performance by the Blues loose forwards. Not so much the locks.
Also unimpressed by Spencer's debut at fullback too. Especially his donkey effort that lead to the Drua's second try.
Akhi, Segner, Darry, Beehre and Wrampling led the defence against a pretty brutal attack. We scored some over those classic maul tries that the Drua struggle against. What about the locks didn't you like?
The amount of ball they dropped or lost with inaccurate carries.
That was happening with both teams in all positions. Ball was slippery. It’s uncomfortable humidity in Auckland at the moment
@antipodean said in Blues v Drua:
@Bones said in Blues v Drua:
@antipodean yeah he was pretty meh to start, but grew into it I thought and ended up at least at the same level as Forbes. Worth persevering.
Agree he's worth persevering with, but Forbes is a low bar these days.
Can't say I've ever been very impressed with Forbes, so yeah faint praise but worth it for the blues.
@Frank said in Blues v Drua:
What is Segner's best position should he able to make the step up to the ABs?
7?
Seemed to complement Barnes as part of a trio but just didn't strike me as nuggety enough for an openside. Wasn't watching all that closely though.
Much improved this year. Huge work rate, hardly misses tackles and makes a lot of them. Has started making turnovers and is one of main line out targets.
I’ve not seen much of a running game or even a passing game. Doesn’t lose it much hitting the ball up, and hits a lot of rucks.
Super valuable bench option when everyone is fit.
Interesting about Payton Spencer. I haven't been overly convinced by him, but he showed some nice touches towards the end. I think a full NPC campaign will do him good.
And yeah, Segner so far, has improved massively. I wasn't overly impressed by him in previous seasons, but this season, his all round game has gone from strength to strength.
This was a really useful game for the squad.. similar to last week against the Tahs
The team tried to win easy and pretty. Too loose in attack and the defence line was passive. Cotter corrected that at halftime and the team goes back to basic 2024 Blues rugby. The pretty tries come late in the game anyway
Some inexperienced players got some lessons about standards and ultimately responded well. Much more useful than if the opposition had been passive
@Duluth said in Blues v Drua:
This was a really useful game for the squad.. similar to last week against the Tahs
The team tried to win easy and pretty. Too loose in attack and the defence line was passive. Cotter corrected that at halftime and the team goes back to basic 2024 Blues rugby. The pretty tries come late in the game anyway
Some inexperienced players got some lessons about standards and ultimately responded well. Much more useful than if the opposition had been passive
Yeah, you learn more from victories from being in tough moments, and despite the scores looking comfortable in the last 2 weeks, we've had to come from behind in both of them, which I don't mind. The young fellas have stepped up to the plate when asked so far.
@African-Monkey said in Blues v Drua:
we've had to come from behind in both of them, which I don't mind. The young fellas have stepped up to the plate when asked so far.
This year and next are transition years. We have a punchers chance of winning the tournament but we probably lack the depth to arrive at the finals in good shape
Still, the new players are going better than I expected. Yes young players will make more errors but it's been really fun to watch the progress. I don't understand how anyone could watch the Vai try and complain about the celebration haha
@Duluth said in Blues v Drua:
@African-Monkey said in Blues v Drua:
we've had to come from behind in both of them, which I don't mind. The young fellas have stepped up to the plate when asked so far.
This year and next are transition years. We have a punchers chance of winning the tournament but we probably lack the depth to arrive at the finals in good shape
Still, the new players are going better than I expected. Yes young players will make more errors but it's been really fun to watch the progress. I don't understand how anyone could watch the Vai try and complain about the celebration haha
Yeah I've said the same too about a rebuild. It won't last as long as previous ones. The title? I wasn't even thinking about it for the next couple of seasons at least, but with no one really standing out (will put the Canes as favourites if they smoke the bigger sides), then maybe we're an outside shot?
We have a very good style for wet weather and finals style football. If we can keep the injuries down we'll be hard to beat.
Spencer gets 'only there for his name' and 'might be worth persevering with' when I reckon he played better than Barrett...?
Gotta say I find it pretty weird that our most capped current AB can put in an error ridden shit performance like that and it be so commonplace that it hardly rates a comment, while an all but debutant at super level is getting a hard time.
@reprobate thought he looked a very similar player to Reihana, but with express pace.