Otago v Hawke's Bay
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Lack of penetration against Southland the reason why Dunn is in at 12 instead of Tofilau?
No lock replacement on the bench means a loose forward is going to have cover - perhaps Mikaele-Tu'u as the biggest? Or Evans as the most experienced? Can't help but feel the Titanic has just left Southampton bound for New York.
Otago will be a more realistic examination than Southland who are heading towards losing all 10 games as they did last year.
So, we will have to bring more to the game than tries off forward drives from a lineout - namely backline penetration and finishing.
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@stargazer said in Otago v Hawke's Bay:
Magpies:
1 Mark Braidwood, 2 Ash Dixon (c), 3 Ben May, 4 Michael Allardice, 5 Tom Parsons, 6 Marino Mikaele-Tu'u, 7 Josh Kaifa, 8 Gareth Evans, 9 Brad Weber, 10 Tiaan Falcon, 11 Mason Emerson, 12 Pasqualle Dunn, 13 Stacey Ili, 14 Jonah Lowe, 15 JJ Taulagi
Reserves
16 Ben Power, 17 Joe Apikotoa, 18 Pouri Rakete-Stones, 19 Devan Flanders, 20 Will Tremain, 21 Folau Fakatava, 22 Sasa Tofilau, 23 Michael Buckley.
So they've swapped Allardice and Parsons, as well as May and Apikotoa, and also Dunn and Tofilau. Ulufonua has been dropped or is injured, and Tremain will make his debut from the bench. I wonder who is covering lock now that Ulufonua is out of the 23? Flanders? Evans?
The published team in this morning's HB Today has Sam Ulufonua in the reserves in place of Will Tremain, which is different to the announcement on the HBRU Facebook page. I prefer this (with Ulufonua) - it has a much better balance.
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@number-10 Yeah, I agree with that. My guess is that either Ulufonua got injured during training and that that's the reason for Tremain's inclusion; or, he was under an injury cloud and he didn't get named, but was cleared in time for the game tonight. It's a pity we don't know which line-up is the most up-to-date one, but I guess we'll find out tonight.
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So that's what Ben Herring looks like without a mullet
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It really looks like Faddis' abilities have followed his hair and vanished. Can't believe he was the NPC player of the year a couple of years ago
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I'm really liking the loose forward balance of the Magpies currently. Hopefully they all stay injury free
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@stockcar86 Was that held up or do we have a visually challenged referee and touch judge?
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No harm in checking is there?
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Certainly not, it looked pretty good from where I was sitting but then again I do see things rather optimistically when it comes to my team.
With a bit of luck some of the passing will be a bit more accurate in the second half. Or maybe that should read some of the catching be a bit better. It looked a bit like simply pass it along and hope for the best. -
Referee finally sees the third knock on by Otago in that movement
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