Blues v Crusaders
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This game showed teams exactly how not to play the Crusaders:
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Never commit numbers to your breakdowns until after you’ve allowed Barrett and every other Crusader forward to play the ball off their feet, lie on the wrong side etc. Etc.,
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play wide out of your own half, and then launch aimless kicks down the middle with no kick chase,
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under no circumstances, launch any hard, direct runs at Channel 1, pick and goes, snipes round the fringes, or inside balls off 10,
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And especially, try and give away as many soft penalties as possible.
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Some things never change
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@Yeetyaah said in Blues v Crusaders:
Sotutu is playing real well. We've got some bloody good loose forwards in NZ.
I'd say "promising". I'm not super convinced we have the next coming of Kaino and Read demanding selection just yet.
Having said that, yes, Sotutu is doing some good things.
And for some reason I started off not wanting Cullen Grace to be any good. My knee-jerk reaction ( @mariner4life ) is he may (may) have a big big future.
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@KiwiMurph said in Blues v Crusaders:
Fun game but result looks inevitable.
Back for back Crusaders are better.
Blues forwards look good except for Parsons.
Eklund can't throw either but would be happy to see him.
Blues attack Perofeta standing deep a lot.
Telea getting exposed under high ball
Saders scrum going very well.
Sotutu looks like a bonafide gun.
Yeah. That was my pre game thoughts. Matched up front but Saders' backs would be too classy.
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@nzzp said in Blues v Crusaders:
@Tim said in Blues v Crusaders:
Blues forwards should go on strike until the backs smarten up
Karl's hinging a bit. Not great, I expected more
Was on wrong side to see.
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Set piece did for Blues. In particular, lineout problems meant pressure couldn't be sustained.
Scrumtime IMHO at least two penalties against Karl T were bogus. On one occasion TH lost bind on his arm and went to ground and Blues still penalised -- WFT? From memory one was a three pointer and another in their 22 following a penalty destroyed our momentum.
We could have been a contender!
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@pakman said in Blues v Crusaders:
Set piece did for Blues. In particular, lineout problems meant pressure couldn't be sustained.
Scrumtime IMHO at least two penalties against Karl T were bogus. On one occasion TH lost bind on his arm and went to ground and Blues still penalised -- WFT? From memory one was a three pointer and another in their 22 following a penalty detroyed our momentum.
We could have been a contender!
You could have also lost by another 20 points as the Crusaders missed about 4 opportunities to score more points.
I think the Blues tactics were poor and the Blues did not win because of that and poor option taking.So were never contenders. -
Some thoughts from last night
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Mo'unga is irreplaceable. He goes down long term the Crusaders are poked. Havili was ok last week, but he isn't a championship winning 10, and we can all see Cameron is not up to it yet.
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Goodhue is doing well at 12. Still undecided if he has the long range kicking instincts to really nail the position. Might come in time. Big year for him. I think we find out if he is the real deal or not this year after a disappointing season from him last year.
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First time I saw why some people from Canterbury have been banging on about Grace. Looks a natural lineout option and there were a couple of thumping ruck clean outs that made me take notice. I was a bit meh about him during the NPC, but the boy did good last night.
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this is not a vintage Crusader forward pack, but the team is still looking well coached.
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don't see Bridge as a long term AB. He cannot beat a man.
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Havali is showing he may be NZ's best fullback (although I would still have Barrett there for the ABs). The perfect bench option?
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The author of this article is clearly a Perofeta fan.
The 22-year-old Perofeta was one of the Blues best players on the night. -
@Stargazer said in Blues v Crusaders:
The author of this article is clearly a Perofeta fan.
The 22-year-old Perofeta was one of the Blues best players on the night.Wow. Just wow. And rugby media wonders why we gravitate to teh Fern and other fan sites.
In fairness, he's better at 15 than 10, but he hasn't kicked on. Not the first 10 to get wrecked by the Blues...
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Still no update about Jager's head injury.
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@Stargazer said in Blues v Crusaders:
The author of this article is clearly a Perofeta fan.
The 22-year-old Perofeta was one of the Blues best players on the night.That's sarcasm. He did a chip kick he was lucky to regather and everything else about his work was dreadful. Normally a developing five-eighth can see opportunities but needs to develop their execution - he's bad at both.
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@nzzp said in Blues v Crusaders:
In fairness, he's better at 15 than 10, but he hasn't kicked on
It's been obvious for a couple of seasons that his best position is 15.
Forget the Blues, his best games for Taranaki have been at 15 and his good cameos at 10 have dried up. Without remembering the individual games, I suspect that small sample of good matches at 10 were behind a dominant Taranaki pack.
The mistake the Blues are making is continuing to select him at 10. It's not his natural position and it's wasting his potential as a fullback -
@Stargazer said in Blues v Crusaders:
@cgrant McKenzie at fullback is not a given. BB might get that 15 jersey, and McKenzie 22.
Shit, I agree. There seems a lot of of love on the Fern for Dmac post RWC, but I personally have never been a fan. Obvs he is good, but he's still too helter skelter for me. I dont mind him.on the bench, as there are certain open games he can be really effective in. But equally I think there are lots of tighter games that he adds little value but plenty of danger to.
[Braces self for intense rebuttal from the Fern]
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@booboo said in Blues v Crusaders:
I still expect Blues to be third in the NZ conference
A confident statement but I'm not really sure your expectations are realistic. The Chiefs, Crusaders and Canes all look alot stronger than the Blues and all have a proven track record of making the playoffs year in and year out. The Blues look like the same rabble of years gone by, a true reflection of a broken culture.
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@Canes4life said in Blues v Crusaders:
@booboo said in Blues v Crusaders:
I still expect Blues to be third in the NZ conference
A confident statement but I'm not really sure your expectations are realistic. The Chiefs, Crusaders and Canes all look alot stronger than the Blues and all have a proven track record of making the playoffs year in and year out. The Blues look like the same rabble of years gone by, a true reflection of a broken culture.
They've played three games.
Two against what I believe are the top two teams in the comp, which they lost. As expected.
I'm not about to head off to the knee-jerk reaction thread just yet.
A fortnight with a couple of good results does amazing things for a team's and fan's confidence.
Imagine if they'd lost any of those games 27 nil (nil!) say.
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@booboo yeah but the same old signs are there of a team that wilters when things get tough. They had a massive lead against the Chiefs and blew it and they hardly fired a shot against the Crusaders. For you to say that you expected them to lose is a great reflection of where the mindset around the Blues stands.
The Canes had a shocker first game (no excuses) but turned around and beat the Jaguares who were on a 10 game winning streak at home, they then returned home and got the job done against a red hot Sharks side. The Canes don't all of a sudden go from Semi-Finalists to the scrap heap just because a certain someone decides to defect North. This is still a very good side, with enough talent in my mind to win the whole thing.
We will see in a few weeks time where these two teams are at, but I'm picking the Canes to comfortably put away the Blues at home and make it 10 wins in a row.
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