Blues 2020
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@Tim pretty strong forward pack if the Blues can grab a decent-ish lock. Maybe taking a punt on someone like Cridge from the Bay, even though he has had injury troubles in the past.
My ?? are in the backs. I think the Blues would look far stronger if they leave Ioane on the left wing and attempt to sign more of a distributing 13. Also wouldn't Clarke be your starting 11 if Ioane was your 13?
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@Canes4life Clarke is playing 7s next year.
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@African-Monkey oh yup.
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Regardless of how the future plays out, Collins looks back at his time with the Blues with some fondness and dismisses criticism of the Auckland franchise's culture.
"Auckland's interesting because you've got such a wide area from where people would have to travel in from for training, whereas in Dunedin everything is obviously five minutes away," he said.
"So, there's obviously restrictions but at my time at the Blues the management found ways around it.
"In the past the Blues used that as excuse. There's a lot of comments about the culture not being good enough but I never found that at all. I loved the culture up there, turning up at training. I'm part of the Highlanders now but I still want the Blues to do well at some stage."
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@Stargazer said in Blues 2020:
That does not seem like a good appointment Waratahs would be glad to get rid of him
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Here's some background on the Blues new CEO:
Hore, 47, originally from Canterbury, was previously CEO of Ospreys Rugby Club in Wales and before then, was High Performance Manager for New Zealand Rugby. He has a deep background in rugby as director of physical conditioning and player development for the Welsh Rugby Union and conditioning coach for the Crusaders.
https://blues.rugby/former-ospreys-and-waratahs-head-takes-over-at-blues/
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From BOP Mafia Twitter - thoughts?
Congratulations to Baden Wardlaw, the Bay Steamers lock, who has been signed by @BluesRugbyTeam - not linking to the Herald article as it is behind the paywall #SteamTeamHe is 1.98m, 115kgs and 29 years old, but hey Alex Ainley was 33 when he debuted for the Highlanders. I have noticed his play and he does go well for the Steamers, seems physical and accurate in his core roles. His tackle stats are at 94%. The interest for me - is he replacing Scrafton who's gone or have they released Goodhue or Pierce? I hope they keep Pierce myself.
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@Daffy-Jaffy From what I was told, Pierce was kept ahead of Scrafton.
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The Blues could certainly use players who do the dirty work in their pack so happy to see how he will go.
Having more players who have come up the via the hard path rather than star schoolboys on the fast track is probably not a bad thing either!
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How much have you seen of Pierce this year? I haven't watched much NPC, but he looked good in what I saw.
That would make four locks (Tuipulotu, GPT, Pierce, Wardlaw) with one to sign. Olmstead?
