Northland v Taranaki
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@steven-harris said in Northland v Taranaki:
I can’t believe the Johnny Cooper I saw as an 18 year old running around for Ponsonby steering them to a Gallagher Shield title looking like he it would only a matter of time before he played for Auckland has turned into this ..he could play wing or fullback and was in amazing shape ..
These players are better than this.
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@steven-harris said in Northland v Taranaki:
@kev if Hohaia has been bad ,Gregory has been next level worse
Everything in this team is just way off. You could see it in the first game - intensity, skill levels , speed.
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what a shambles that 2nd half was!!
There is no point me mentioning Hohaia, cos I done clocked that game!!
Gregory, one of his worst shifts, accuracy was poor, hands like feet!
I did like Tu'ungafasi, although he spent alot of the 1st half being tended by the physio, so no surprses he went off.
Manu was looking good, until the 42nd minute.
Gotta say they looked flat the moment they came out of the sheds, and then Grant put up that kick that put us straight under the pump, then a few phases later, bye Manu.
Nock was looking good, Reihana does look a class act.
I like Hallam-Eames, busy and abrasive, Rob RUsh was pretty good out there too, boy he is a unit.
That red was the game changer, thought we were still in it, but we lacked the energy in the 2nd spell, Caird sparked them when he came on, but too little too late.
Tua looked handy in his few minutes, Leilua looking the best he has, then got injured, didnt really see what happened, thought may have been an HIA?
So Manu likely 3 week break, wonder if now they put in a call to Matich, although he probably wouldnt want to join now!
2 games, 2 Red cards...yikes!!
Oh, the big screen is a superb addition to the ground, although means we all saw a couple of forward passes the ref didnt haha
Vote for your MOTM
https://www.forum.thesilverfern.com/topic/4795/northland-motm-v-taranaki/2 -
@taniwharugby four games in ( including 2 pre season ) and l would comfortably say we are the worst prepared team in the competition. No doubt in my mind that we have the talent but players look lost. Playing on emotion with big hits only gets you so far. The rest is about preparation - player development, contracting, pre season work ( like fitness? ), selections, game day plans. Year after year we under perform. It’s seems we have an organisational culture accepting of low performance - she will be right. Well she is not right. There are some amazing Northland players out there yet we struggle to put a team on the field that performs - for some forty years at least it seems. That’s no accident.
We have some good players to come back in with Caird ( looked good in his cameo ) Pryor, Brady Rush and Big Red. But we also have some good players underperforming in Gregory and Cooper, and Hyland so obviously playing out of position. Some questionable signings (players that have not performed before) seem to have left us with no options. Turning this around mid season is going to be very hard if not impossible. I’m going to be watching every game as usual but the hope is gone already and it feels like deja vu.
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@kev said in Northland v Taranaki:
Pryor, Brady Rush and Big Red
thing is, no idea when any are available.
Which brings me to a point I was discussing with @J77 and @Steven-Harris which shows incredibly poor planning.
Loosies for 2021
Manu, Momoedavu, Mau - rookies
Rush - played a handful of minutes for Northland
Pryor, who I assume was thier main man for 7, not available until week 5?? Granted, they cant expect he would pick up a ban, but he was playing over seas, heard his ban was 3 weeks, still shit planning somewhere
McNamara - his game in pre-seaosn was his first in 6 weeks or so
Robinson - only an injury away from making the ABs, and now out with head injurySo then we come back to Matich, who for some reason, isnt even good enough to make the squad!! He is EXACTLY the type of player we have missed these last 2 weeks, workrate, accuracy and the energy he brings.
As to comments about fitness, as I said to @Steven-Harris earlier in the week, they need to be writing fitness KPIs into contracts of some of these guys, and if they dont meet them by the end of club footy RR, they are gone.
Last year I thought we looked fit, we had plenty left in the tank in the 2nd half of most games last year, this year, plenty gassed after 40.
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All I heard during the off season was a bunch of dribble about our new flash facilities etc, all good and well to a small degree, but obviously player development and recruitment was left well down the list.
Bar a couple of signings announcements I heard nothing about how the Taniwha were building to go one better than their runner up medal last year.
Looking at some of the players tonight and it’s quite clear they are well out of shape. This showed in the second half when we just dropped our sacks. Heaps of guys were hobbling around too which usually comes down to bad conditioning coupled with heavy contact, not a good combo.
I’m sorry to say but this lays on all those off the field - coaches, managers, CEO and support staff. Some tough stuff will have to be said from the top and some big decisions made if our season spirals out of control.
As for the game, Naki thoroughly deserved their victory after that second half effort, they showed patience and made their phases count. They look a capable team this year and are my early favourites for promotion.
As for us, well, absolute garbage would be about it. Show the jersey some respect and play like you’re capable. We have the cattle, but it seems the cattle are way under prepared and have rested on their laurels after last years lofty heights.
Just because I like banging my head against a brick wall we need to suck it up and call Matty Matich, get him in there ASAP!
Drop Hohaia to the Bs and bring in Kalani Going. Hohaia needs a baby leash on him and someone needs to yank it every time he rushes out of the line. So frustrating. He puts so much pressure on those around him. I dare say Gregory wouldn’t have had the shocker he did had he had Tua beside him the whole game.
Manus red card cost us, and Nock going off didn’t help. Oh how we miss big Red too!
Impressive were the likes of Nock, Hallam-Eames and Rob Rush, those dudes did everything you could ask in a pretty shit situation.
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@j77 the gutting thing for me is that over the past 5 or 10+ years, we have shown glimpses of what we are capable of, yet we simply dont kick on.
It is like our Coaches/Board are happy with mediocrity, although, most of the time, we are under that.
We have so many talented kids coming out of our region, but with our poor coaching and lack of success of getting only the very best into super teams, why would a young kid with a big future come back here?
ALready heard of a Northland kid out of St Kents who has been picked up by one of the crusaders vaccums, then you look over the Auckland side and see there are 3 or 4 from up here, even the b side there are more again...guys we could desperately use.
Sure we get some of Aucklands overflow too, but often they are surplus for a reason.
If my kid was looking at signing with an NPC team, I'd be steering him toward another province...I'd hate that!
THis new HP Centre will be great, but if we cant match it with on field performance, it will be pointless.
While it was great to make the final last year, for me, it was the worst thing that could happen, it papered over the huge cracks in our coaching team, and squad selection.
I think a few players may have rested on thier laurels form last year, but equally, the coaches need to take the heat for not looking at the squad and seeing the gaps.
The only real ones they plugged were Reihana and Hallam-Eames, and he was only a last minute one, so probably more luck than good planning.
As I said to @Steven-Harris he needs to get on the NRU books as a scout in the Auckland and NH comps, he watches a ton more rugby than most, is passionate about his Union, and like me, I bet he'd do it for free too!
When you look at our squad, they have the core of a very good side, one that could be knocking at the top 4 side in the Premiership with Olsen, Goodhue, Caird, Robinson, Nock, Gregory, Tua (if he werent made of glass) and then build around them, add the likes of Hyland, Hallam-Eames, Macilai, Wright, Rush, Pryor and there is no reason why we should not be finals contendors in the Championship, pushing for promotion, but it is the average players they put elsewhere and lack of preparation, coaching, and we have 2 50 pointers over us and 2 red cards in 2 weeks...
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@taniwharugby said in Northland v Taranaki:
@j77 the gutting thing for me is that over the past 5 or 10+ years, we have shown glimpses of what we are capable of, yet we simply dont kick on.
It is like our Coaches/Board are happy with mediocrity, although, most of the time, we are under that.
We have so many talented kids coming out of our region, but with our poor coaching and lack of success of getting only the very best into super teams, why would a young kid with a big future come back here?
ALready heard of a Northland kid out of St Kents who has been picked up by one of the crusaders vaccums, then you look over the Auckland side and see there are 3 or 4 from up here, even the b side there are more again...guys we could desperately use.
Sure we get some of Aucklands overflow too, but often they are surplus for a reason.
If my kid was looking at signing with an NPC team, I'd be steering him toward another province...I'd hate that!
THis new HP Centre will be great, but if we cant match it with on field performance, it will be pointless.
While it was great to make the final last year, for me, it was the worst thing that could happen, it papered over the huge cracks in our coaching team, and squad selection.
I think a few players may have rested on thier laurels form last year, but equally, the coaches need to take the heat for not looking at the squad and seeing the gaps.
The only real ones they plugged were Reihana and Hallam-Eames, and he was only a last minute one, so probably more luck than good planning.
As I said to @Steven-Harris he needs to get on the NRU books as a scout in the Auckland and NH comps, he watches a ton more rugby than most, is passionate about his Union, and like me, I bet he'd do it for free too!
When you look at our squad, they have the core of a very good side, one that could be knocking at the top 4 side in the Premiership with Olsen, Goodhue, Caird, Robinson, Nock, Gregory, Tua (if he werent made of glass) and then build around them, add the likes of Hyland, Hallam-Eames, Macilai, Wright, Rush, Pryor and there is no reason why we should not be finals contendors in the Championship, pushing for promotion, but it is the average players they put elsewhere and lack of preparation, coaching, and we have 2 50 pointers over us and 2 red cards in 2 weeks...
All of this.
