v Auckland
-
So, first time in over 10 years Auckland pay a visit to Okara Park, hopefully we can make them not want to come back in a hurry!
While an unchanged line up wouldnt surprise, I think Matich to start and maybe even give Kitto a shot.
Weather looking good, hopefully be a good walk up crowd!
-
-
@taniwharugby was keen to head up to it, but it's the day after the Test. Not great timing unfortunately
-
Rinakama & Matich come in to start as Straker and Matiu drop to the bench.
Northland Team to face Auckland:
1 Ross Wright, 2 Matt Moulds, 3 Ropate Rinakama, 4 Tom Robinson, 5 Josh Goodhue, 6 Murray Douglas, 7 Kara Pryor, 8 Matt Matich, 9 Sam Nock, 10 Jack Debreczeni, 11 Rene Ranger, 12 Blake Hohaia, 13 Tamati Tua, 14 Jordan Hyland, 15 Matty Wright
Reserves: 16 Jordan Olsen, 17 Isileli Tu'ungafasi, 18 Jack Straker, 19 Kane Jacobson, 20 Jaycob Matiu, 21 Jono Kitto, 22 Myles Throughgood, 23 Scott Gregory -
@j77 of course we can win. We shouldn’t be backward about it. Lets back ourselves. Be smart, play tough and stay in the fight. A weakness last week was exits so with another week of training we should be lot better e.g. running at outside shoulder of first five.
-
@kev love your confidence, that’s exactly what I wanted to say, but you said it for me!
This is our best shot in 10 years of beating Auckland, no better time than now to scratch a rare W in the column against these guys.
If we can negate their strong loose trio, we’re most of the way there. Just got to be smart at breakdowns, get numbers there quickly and make the clean outs effective. Can’t let the Blues one man band Akira have his usual field day!
Looking forward to it, should be a cracker. Hope the crowd piles into Okara Park. Gutted I can’t be there.
-
mild and overcast, might get the odd light shower (assuming it is doing the same in town as it is here)
-
Very disappointing 2nd 40. Weren't up to much, Auckland were much better though.
Ref made a lot of odd calls, Auckland were a good metre off side all night, not that that made a huge difference in the end but still frustrating.
Need to involve Ranger much more, either with the ball or as a decoy, he was integral to both our 1st half tries, barely used him in the 2nd spell when we did get the ball.
We also need to be smarter, after defending staunchly on our line in the 1st half, we try to run it out and then knock on; Matt Wright trying to run it out from the 22 when he was back by himself, was very silly.
So 2 good 40s and 2 poor ones and now 0/2 (2/35 v Auckland) and a much improved performance form Taranaki making us look squarely down the barrell...
-
Well that was shit.
Didn’t like our tactics at all, they were squeezing from the outside and easily shutting us down. Should have changed it up and attacked closed to the ruck with pick and goes.
Should have done more with the wealth of possession and territory we seemed to have in the first 40.
Second half, well bugger me we didn’t even turn up.
Really disappointed!
-
-
@j77 or even put Gregory on the wing, he looks to have something about him.
Really expected tua to start carving up at this level if he wants to be looked at seriously for super rugby, but definitely underwhelming so far, both sides of the ball.
Obviously you hear things about people (some might be bs some might be true) and the bits I've heard about Tua (that I hope are wrong) lead me to think being dropped and made to work his way back might be good for him.
-
@taniwharugby agree with the comments about Tua defensively. But he is young and we need to keep developing him. I thought when Ranger went into centre we tried too much and made mistakes. I like him in his roving role.
Can’t express how disappointing this was. Missed chances in first half. Fell away from a game plan in the second. Imagine the guys will be disappointed as well.
But I thought the effort was huge - and we have the players. Better game plan, better execution, better decision making will turn it around.
-
@kev not suggesting we can him, but he has had a pretty rapid rise to where he is, and some handle things differently.
Maybe a spell on the bench might focus him, he is a much better player than we have seen thus far, he almost looks a little disinterested.
We were chasing the game by the time Ranger went to 13 so always expect things to change.
-
Maybe it’s time to give Gregory a shot. He’s a talent that guy, and looks to be keen and willing to learn.
Wouldn’t mind seeing Roberts-Te Nana given a jam on the wing. By all accounts he went well for the B’s.
I think a spot on the bench would benefit Tua, might be the rocket up his ass he needs. He’s a highly skilled player with stacks of potential, but seriously, to miss that many tackles at this level is not good enough.
Hopefully we pull finger for Taranaki this week, getting into must win territory now....
