Blues 2022
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The Blues held the Chiefs scoreless and Cully was full of praise for the impact of Joe Schmidt, the Kiwi who coached Ireland from 2013-2019 and returned to NZ as an assistant to Leon MacDonald this season.
“When you look at the Blues I’ve got two words for you – Joe Schmidt,” said Cully.
“He was hired at the start of the year. His influence is really becoming apparent.
“When they were down in Dunedin at the start of the season I watched him before the games started. He is a magnificent, world class coach and the word is that the Blues players, including their senior All Blacks are hanging on his every word, rate him incredibly highly.
“The Blues have been building for two or three years but I think Schmidt’s addition has taken them to another level.”
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@duluth it's still so recent we couldn't pick up a win against kiwi opposition.
What's awesome is we're still building, expecting to get better year on year. The talent identification has finally got good, and we're seeing the results.
It's been a lot of Shawshank before the redemption
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@nzzp said in Blues 2022:
@duluth it's still so recent we couldn't pick up a win against kiwi opposition.
What's awesome is we're still building, expecting to get better year on year. The talent identification has finally got good, and we're seeing the results.
It's been a lot of Shawshank before the redemption
The last two games have been epic away wins, wasn’t that long ago we couldn’t even win away let alone play like that.
Amazing what a good coach can do (side eye at the All Blacks)
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@tim I said in the game thread, the blues ruckwork and defence was surely a mark of Schmidt which can only be good for NZ rugby, that game, regardless of the 2 teams colours, was on the best since the start of covid I reckon, and as I have said elsewhere, a sign that the covid disruptions that appear to have plagued our entire game are hopefully on thier way out.
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@duluth said in Blues 2022:
Blues have won:
5 of the last 6 vs Chiefs
4 of the last 6 vs Hurricanes
6 of the last 7 vs Highlanders..and 1 of the last 1 vs the Crusaders
Just saw this over at Rugbypass:
Head back to the beginning of 2019 and the Blues had gone winless against fellow New Zealand side in 20 matches on the trot. Now, they’ve won six of their last seven encounters with the Highlanders, five of their last six with the Chiefs and four of their last six with the Hurricanes. The win against the Crusaders is just the icing on the cake.
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@tim and it's been building for some time. Broken record for me, but the change in the board is what's enabled this success.
What's really heartening is we're setting up for sustained success with structures, relationships, training facilities, talent scouting and the admin side. The coaching relies on competence in those areas, that we didn't use to have
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“World-class” Ioane eyes All Blacks centre position
Rieko Ioane has impressed as a centre on the Super stage.
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@Tim in theory, I assume Christie could pass his HIA tests in the week and be available for next week?
Although it looked pretty bad, so you'd think he will have at least this week off.
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@taniwharugby I wouldn't want to take any risks with him or Hodgman. Especially with Nock out for a few more weeks.
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@Tim Northlands Alan Craig trained with the team in preseason so maybe lock cover -
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I think this is somewhat relevant to Blues:
