How many Crusaders in your AB 23?
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@taniwharugby said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@nzzp said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
Whitelock is there on reputation and experience.
same applies for Retallick, which is a big concern.
I think Whitelocks form is still up there and expect his workrate to increase in Black. Also Lock is one position where it is good to have the old bloke in the team.
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@Nevorian said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@taniwharugby said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@nzzp said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
Whitelock is there on reputation and experience.
same applies for Retallick, which is a big concern.
I think Whitelocks form is still up there and expect his workrate to increase in Black. Also Lock is one position where it is good to have the old bloke in the team.
Also Whitelock has so far had a disrupted season he didn’t start SR until week 4.
Then has just come back from 4 weeks out with a broken finger .
He will get better the more he can string games together.
I wouldn’t want our AB’s peaking now it’s a long way to July,let alone August,September etc. -
@Kirwan said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Damo said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
Is there any glee? I hadn't noticed any.
But in any event a competition where the results are predictable makes for a boring watch.
The Crusaders losing occasionally is no bad thing.
One person’s reputation that improved yesterday was Richie Mounga. He’s been papering over some pretty large cracks by the looks of things.
The real problem for the Crusaders is that their forward pack is made up of players who are all fairly ordinary and lack any real point of difference (Jager, Grace, Bower, Klein, Christie, McAlister, Gardiner, etc..) in addition to experienced campaigners who are quite obviously past it & have lost their edge (Taylor, Moody, Whitelock, Barrett). this all without mentioning the long list of supremely average backs making up the remainder of their squad (Ennor, Havili, Bridge, Drummond, McLeod, Burke, TTT, Hickey, Punivai, etc..)
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@kiwi_expat said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Kirwan said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Damo said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
Is there any glee? I hadn't noticed any.
But in any event a competition where the results are predictable makes for a boring watch.
The Crusaders losing occasionally is no bad thing.
One person’s reputation that improved yesterday was Richie Mounga. He’s been papering over some pretty large cracks by the looks of things.
The real problem for the Crusaders is that their forward pack is made up of players who are all fairly ordinary and lack any real point of difference (Jager, Grace, Bower, Klein, Christie, McAlister, Gardiner, etc..) in addition to experienced campaigners who are quite obviously past it & have lost their edge (Taylor, Moody, Whitelock, Barrett). this all without mentioning the long list of supremely average backs making up the remainder of their squad (Ennor, Havili, Bridge, Drummond, McLeod, Burke, TTT, Hickey, Punivai, etc..)
And yet somehow, as if by magic, the Crusaders are not the last placed NZ team. Thank God for all the help they get from the refs.
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@Crazy-Horse said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@kiwi_expat said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Kirwan said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Damo said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
Is there any glee? I hadn't noticed any.
But in any event a competition where the results are predictable makes for a boring watch.
The Crusaders losing occasionally is no bad thing.
One person’s reputation that improved yesterday was Richie Mounga. He’s been papering over some pretty large cracks by the looks of things.
The real problem for the Crusaders is that their forward pack is made up of players who are all fairly ordinary and lack any real point of difference (Jager, Grace, Bower, Klein, Christie, McAlister, Gardiner, etc..) in addition to experienced campaigners who are quite obviously past it & have lost their edge (Taylor, Moody, Whitelock, Barrett). this all without mentioning the long list of supremely average backs making up the remainder of their squad (Ennor, Havili, Bridge, Drummond, McLeod, Burke, TTT, Hickey, Punivai, etc..)
And yet somehow, as if by magic, the Crusaders are not the last placed NZ team. Thank God for all the help they get from the refs.
And by a minor miracle could still finish 2nd for the play offs.
Amazing considering we have no decent players. -
10 months later & I would only have one Crusader starting and that would be Scott Barrett.
McKenzie is a superior player to Mo'unga whether that be at 10 or 15.
Roigard, Ratima, Weber, Smith are the best 9's.
The best props are from Hurricanes/Chiefs/Highlanders, highest quality of everything else in the tight forwards are from Chiefs, loose forwards: Blues & Canes, midfielders: Chiefs, Canes, Blues.
The All Black's starting back three are currently all Blues players.
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@kiwi_expat said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
10 months later & I would only have one Crusader starting and that would be Scott Barrett.
McKenzie is a superior player to Mo'unga whether that be at 10 or 15.
Yep the way D Mac missed touch from penalties kicked like a retard and dropped the ball 3 times cold in his last outing he sure looked it.
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@kiwi_expat I am of the belief that the NZ XV side which was coached by Leon Macdonald was close to what will be rolled out in the not too distant future. The Saders have started off fairly slow this year and the coach has experienced a few disruptions.
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@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@kiwi_expat said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
10 months later & I would only have one Crusader starting and that would be Scott Barrett.
McKenzie is a superior player to Mo'unga whether that be at 10 or 15.
Yep the way D Mac missed touch from penalties kicked like a retard and dropped the ball 3 times cold in his last outing he sure looked it.
If Mo wasn't prone to all of that regularly then we wouldn't be having this discussion ...
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@Nepia said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@kiwi_expat said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
10 months later & I would only have one Crusader starting and that would be Scott Barrett.
McKenzie is a superior player to Mo'unga whether that be at 10 or 15.
Yep the way D Mac missed touch from penalties kicked like a retard and dropped the ball 3 times cold in his last outing he sure looked it.
If Mo wasn't prone to all of that regularly then we wouldn't be having this discussion ...
No argument from me but it’s replacing the same sort of player with another one of the same.
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@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Nepia said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@kiwi_expat said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
10 months later & I would only have one Crusader starting and that would be Scott Barrett.
McKenzie is a superior player to Mo'unga whether that be at 10 or 15.
Yep the way D Mac missed touch from penalties kicked like a retard and dropped the ball 3 times cold in his last outing he sure looked it.
If Mo wasn't prone to all of that regularly then we wouldn't be having this discussion ...
No argument from me but it’s replacing the same sort of player with another one of the same.
Maybe he'll be better than the other two? May as well give him a shot and we can annoy both you lot and the Blues at the same time.
Also, this same sort is a lot braver in defence ...
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@Nepia said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Nepia said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@kiwi_expat said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
10 months later & I would only have one Crusader starting and that would be Scott Barrett.
McKenzie is a superior player to Mo'unga whether that be at 10 or 15.
Yep the way D Mac missed touch from penalties kicked like a retard and dropped the ball 3 times cold in his last outing he sure looked it.
If Mo wasn't prone to all of that regularly then we wouldn't be having this discussion ...
No argument from me but it’s replacing the same sort of player with another one of the same.
Maybe he'll be better than the other two? May as well give him a shot and we can annoy both you lot and the Blues at the same time.
Also, this same sort is a lot braver in defence ...
It won’t annoy me mate,I can sit back and bag the shit out of a Chiefs player and he will give me plenty of ammo.
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A couple of early season loses, doesn’t mean this will be too far off from previous years.
Barrett and Whitelock are certainties, as are Mounga , Jordan and some others.
Hopefully we don’t have Philpott selections i.e. Enor
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The form side so far:
- E De Groot
- S Taukei'aho
- T Lomax
- B Retallick
- S Barrett
- E Blackadder
- D Papalii
- A Savea
- B Webber
- D Mckenzie
- S Reece
- J Barrett
- A Nankivell
- M Telea
- S Stevenson
Vs what they will pick:
1.E De Groot
2. C Taylor
3. T Lomax
4. B Retallick
5. S Barrett
6. S Frizzell
7. S Cane
8. A Savea
9. A Smith
10. R Mo'unga
11. C Clarke
12. J Barrett
13. R Ioane
14. M Telea
15. B Barrett -
@Mackerzzzz I bloody hope they don't pick on form at this stage of year, after plenty only playing 1 or 2 games. I know form teams are just that, and have no relation to who should be in test team.
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@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Nepia said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Nepia said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@kiwi_expat said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
10 months later & I would only have one Crusader starting and that would be Scott Barrett.
McKenzie is a superior player to Mo'unga whether that be at 10 or 15.
Yep the way D Mac missed touch from penalties kicked like a retard and dropped the ball 3 times cold in his last outing he sure looked it.
If Mo wasn't prone to all of that regularly then we wouldn't be having this discussion ...
No argument from me but it’s replacing the same sort of player with another one of the same.
Maybe he'll be better than the other two? May as well give him a shot and we can annoy both you lot and the Blues at the same time.
Also, this same sort is a lot braver in defence ...
It won’t annoy me mate,I can sit back and bag the shit out of a Chiefs player and he will give me plenty of ammo.
Difference between you and me I guess. I don’t bag the shot out of Mo despite the frequency of the ammo. 🤣
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@Nepia said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Nepia said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Nepia said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@kiwi_expat said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
10 months later & I would only have one Crusader starting and that would be Scott Barrett.
McKenzie is a superior player to Mo'unga whether that be at 10 or 15.
Yep the way D Mac missed touch from penalties kicked like a retard and dropped the ball 3 times cold in his last outing he sure looked it.
If Mo wasn't prone to all of that regularly then we wouldn't be having this discussion ...
No argument from me but it’s replacing the same sort of player with another one of the same.
Maybe he'll be better than the other two? May as well give him a shot and we can annoy both you lot and the Blues at the same time.
Also, this same sort is a lot braver in defence ...
It won’t annoy me mate,I can sit back and bag the shit out of a Chiefs player and he will give me plenty of ammo.
Difference between you and me I guess. I don’t bag the shot out of Mo despite the frequency of the ammo. 🤣
Feel free too it’s open season on ABs and coach’s
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@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Nepia said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Nepia said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Nepia said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@Chris said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
@kiwi_expat said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
10 months later & I would only have one Crusader starting and that would be Scott Barrett.
McKenzie is a superior player to Mo'unga whether that be at 10 or 15.
Yep the way D Mac missed touch from penalties kicked like a retard and dropped the ball 3 times cold in his last outing he sure looked it.
If Mo wasn't prone to all of that regularly then we wouldn't be having this discussion ...
No argument from me but it’s replacing the same sort of player with another one of the same.
Maybe he'll be better than the other two? May as well give him a shot and we can annoy both you lot and the Blues at the same time.
Also, this same sort is a lot braver in defence ...
It won’t annoy me mate,I can sit back and bag the shit out of a Chiefs player and he will give me plenty of ammo.
Difference between you and me I guess. I don’t bag the shot out of Mo despite the frequency of the ammo. 🤣
Feel free too it’s open season on ABs and coach’s
Nah, my feelings about Mo and BB are I just don’t care to bag either of them out as they both have issues.
The coach stuff is mostly boring now.
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@Nepia said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
The coach stuff is mostly boring now.
We're degenerating into 'knocking the others makes my dude better'. It's like the politics thread all over again. We unite that Foster's must go, but after that it's more factions than a political conference.
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@Mackerzzzz said in How many Crusaders in your AB 23?:
The form side so far:
- E De Groot
- S Taukei'aho
- T Lomax
- B Retallick
- S Barrett
- E Blackadder
- D Papalii
- A Savea
- B Webber
- D Mckenzie
- S Reece
- J Barrett
- A Nankivell
- M Telea
- S Stevenson
Vs what they will pick:
1.E De Groot
2. C Taylor
3. T Lomax
4. B Retallick
5. S Barrett
6. S Frizzell
7. S Cane
8. A Savea
9. A Smith
10. R Mo'unga
11. C Clarke
12. J Barrett
13. R Ioane
14. M Telea
15. B BarrettAumua surely replaces Taylor in the 23, another Crusaders All Black who's about 5 years past his best.
Impressive how Razor won the title in 2022, considering his fading, ageing or limited (now mainly fringe All Blacks) who simply pale in comparison to the dynamic talent on display in those Chiefs, Blues, Canes squads.
