SF: Crusaders (Good) v Blues (Evil)
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Another season ends with a thumping from the Crusaders.
Tight five not up to it. Papalii stuck on the wing, Sotutu poor. Christie and Barrett poor. Backline full of holes. Just not a good team this year. MacDonald probably spent the season thinking about his next job ...
Crusaders a great team. Their ABs really stood up.
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Taylor, Barrett, Mo’unga, Fainga’anuku, Jordan and even Ennor all played well.
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@Kirwan said in SF: Crusaders (Good) v Blues (Evil):
@KiwiMurph said in SF: Crusaders (Good) v Blues (Evil):
@Kirwan said in SF: Crusaders (Good) v Blues (Evil):
Have to respect that, was like watch a kid the wings off a fly.
Be interested to know what it takes for you to rip into Leon and some of these Blues players.
Happy for fair criticism, but this place has their favourites to get stuck into. Sullivan getting any praise for that performance is hilarious.
Eklunds lineouts we’re abysmal.
Feel better?
As shit as Eklund was the damage was done by then
How about the AB centre shelling a pass (again) in the first 2 minutes.
How about the Blues having an entirely predictable attacking shape (again).
How about the captain and leaders doing nothing whilst the team is blown away in the first half (again).
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Also, the Blues seemed to have Akira wide on the right and Paps wide on the left.
WTF.
Was it some sort of innovative plan that failed completely?
Anyway, class game from the Crusaders. If it wasn't the Chiefs being left I'd want the Crusaders to win so our new AB coach goes into next year off a win. But I hope the Chiefs beat them like a redhead stepson (or a Christie) next week, assuming they can get up over the Brumbies.
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Would be easy to pick the bones out of the Blues performance but in all honesty its a night where all the credit goes to the Saders
They dominated every facet especially at breakdown but more importantly they absolutely squeezed the Blues and cut their space down testimony to that was Telea,Clark or Ioane did not feature
And they took every scoring opportunity with ruthless efficiency
A master class from Robertson and coaching staff and when you consider the personel they had missing makes it even more impressive -
@Tim as did thier non-abs.
A back row of Lio-willie, christie and havili out playing Sotutu, Paps and Akira...
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@KiwiMurph said in SF: Crusaders (Good) v Blues (Evil):
How about the Blues having an entirely predictable attacking shape (again).
The worst aspect about this is every time they use forwards as distributors out the back to backs, they never engage the defence because they're doing it flat footed. So it's the easiest thing to make a good decision on as a defender - come forward and make a dominant tackle. Next thing you know, the defence are moving forward and the attackers can't support at the breakdown. Rinse, repeat, kick possession away because you're going nowhere.
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@Steven-Harris said in SF: Crusaders (Good) v Blues (Evil):
when you consider the personel they had missing makes it even more impressive
Let's give this a rest and concentrate on the personnel they didn't have missing.
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@antipodean said in SF: Crusaders (Good) v Blues (Evil):
@KiwiMurph said in SF: Crusaders (Good) v Blues (Evil):
How about the Blues having an entirely predictable attacking shape (again).
The worst aspect about this is every time they use forwards as distributors out the back to backs, they never engage the defence because they're doing it flat footed. So it's the easiest thing to make a good decision on as a defender - come forward and make a dominant tackle. Next thing you know, the defence are moving forward and the attackers can't support at the breakdown. Rinse, repeat, kick possession away because you're going nowhere.
The damning thing is it didn’t change at half time. Game plan clearly not working, fucking change it.
Ironically the few cross kicks we tried weren’t terrible, go back to the kicking game for a bit to slow the blitz.
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@Canes4life said in SF: Crusaders (Good) v Blues (Evil):
Well Foster has plenty to ponder after that one.
That’s the interesting thing for me. No one expected that score line but I think everyone would say that for large % of their games this year the Blues have been poor but still good enough to sink teams with 20 minutes of runaway rugby. So what do you do with the AB Blues players that were on the end of that hiding? So hard to say…systems, skills, decision making.
But if someone likes Laulala makes the AB squad I would be surprised.
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There’s just something about playing the Blues at this time of the year that gets a Crusaders team buzzing. Perhaps it all stems back to 2003 and Carlos running to the corner 😉, but we do seem to lift several notches.
I wouldn’t be all down on the Blues. Thought they had a good season. But after 20 minutes it looked as though the tank had been emptied and the players confidence had dropped considerably.
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@Bones is that not how you judge a coach ..?, on his ability to deal with adversity when injuries and unavailability happens
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@ACT-Crusader said in SF: Crusaders (Good) v Blues (Evil):
I wouldn’t be all down on the Blues. Thought they had a good season. But after 20 minutes it looked as though the tank had been emptied and the players confidence had dropped considerably.
A good season? Blues lost to Chiefs, Brumbies and thrice to Crusaders.
When push came to shove against a team that they can't bully they sucked.
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Thought Angus Gardner was superb
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@KiwiMurph said in SF: Crusaders (Good) v Blues (Evil):
@ACT-Crusader said in SF: Crusaders (Good) v Blues (Evil):
I wouldn’t be all down on the Blues. Thought they had a good season. But after 20 minutes it looked as though the tank had been emptied and the players confidence had dropped considerably.
A good season? Blues lost to Chiefs, Brumbies and twice to Crusaders.
When push came to shove against a team that they can't bully they sucked.
Oh come on, coming third is not a good season? Get your hand off it.
