Aviva Premiership - Round 5 Preview

First topic message reminder :

Well we arrive at the last round before the short break for European matches with Dean Richards self-proclaimed "Top 3" ensconced at the top of the table, while Worcester are the only side yet to win a match:

Table:

Friday 4th October 2013

Sale v Bath 19:45 BT Sports
The round starts with 4th placed Bath facing a Sale team that have been a little bit Jekyl and Hyde this season. Neither side feature in the top Tier European tournament this season, so we can expect them to be naming the best available teams available to them. With Nick McLeod still injured we should expect the latest FH wunderkind, George Ford, to be facing up to a predecessor in Danny Cipriani. Gnarly Bath forwards like Paul James, Dave Attwood and Rob Webber have been in the press this week talking up ford's England potential and talking about how bossy and mature he is as he directs the game. You do wonder sometimes just how much respect the forwards Cips has played with have for him?
Bath have a high profile and very strong front 5, though there are injury worries in the second row - which could see MattGarvey moving from the back row to the position many want to see him play for England. There will also be injury concerns at Full Back, with Anthony Watson leaving early last week.
While Bath have the high profile forwards, the Sale pack are well drilled by Steve Diamond. They certainly have thw wherewithall to make life difficult for Bath.
On top form Bath should win. however if they are even an ounce away from that Sale will push them all the way and would be confident of sneaking the win that would move them even further away from the relegation worries.


Saturday 5th October 2013

London Irish v Harlequins 15:00
Perhaps the last thing a struggling London Irish team needed was the arrival of a wounded animal like the Harlequins. COS was already a touch defensive when asked about Deano's comments and defeat to Sarries will have hurt the whole team. Harlequins cannot afford to even think about the HEC, as defeat in Reading would probably see them move into the bottom half of the table.
So far this season, Quins have struggled to express themselves when they have been roughed up by the physical sides they have faced (Saints and Sarries). London Irish surely have to try and do the same - but I am not sure they have the players to do that. Instead they will be looking to keep the tempo high and let the game flow - usually something that plays right into Quins hands.
I am struggling to see LI getting much from this fixture.


Saracens v London Wasps 15:00
Sarries perfect start to the season was dented, but only slightly, as Quins deprived them of a TBP. This season Sarries have cranked up the physical side of their game (especially with the arrival of Billy Vunipola) but have also started to score tries. They seem to have realised that a strong defence only gets you so far. Will Sarries look at resting some key players before next weeks visit to Western Ireland? They may feel that in the pack they can afford to do so, but having been shocked by Wasps towards the end of last season they will want revenge.
Wasps fans will have been glad to see Elliot Daly playing again, but a little disheartened at Andy Goode's failings from the kicking tee. They surely cannot compete with Sarries up front, so will need to take every chance that comes there way. While goalkicking has been a worry, in Christian Wade they have a man who can create tries from nothing. the pace of Varndell is unlikely to be available on the other wing.
I suspect Sarries will secure another 5pt victory.


Worcester v Newcastle 15:00
While it is still too early in the season for this to be a relegation decider - Worcester simply cannot afford to enter the Euro-break with another defeat. Dean ryan has been talking up Chris Pennell this week and the least exotic member of the Warrior's backline has certainly been their standout performer so far this season. However it is unlikely to be the form of the full-backs that decides this bottom of the table encounter.
Neither side has looked capable of scoring lots of points this season, with just 37pts scored Falcons are the only side to have scored fewer points than the Warriors. This means that defence, discipline and precision will be key. As far as defence goes, Worcester are shipping 30pts per match. As to precision - well it seems that the Falcons hookers could not hit the proverbial barn door.
Worcester simply have to win, and that desire should just see them home.


Leicester v Northampton 15:15   BT Sports
As usual, the East Midlands derby will be on live TV. Saints travel to Welford Rd in good form, but on the back of a long losing streak to their neighbours. The first sell-out crowd will hope to see another intense and exciting match from these two "old friends". Before last season's final, I bemoaned the lack of passion in these fixtures since the Clark/Hawkins incident. That final however shattered any illusions that this is just another fixture. Richard Cockerill is still on the naughty step, as Paul Burke leads Tigers to what I hope will be another convincing win.
The scrum battle will be interesting, and from my seat in the stand I will also be concentrating on what happens to Flood after he has played the ball. He is a very brave young man, but is starting to look a little fragile as teams seek to rough him up. sometimes it is right on the limits of legality, other times players are going well beyond - but the intent is there - opposition are looking to hurt him. Following his 1 match ban following a red card on Monday, Ryan Lamb will be unable to make an appearance against his most recent former team. something Tigers fans will probably be pleased about.
shoudl be a titanic struggle - but I see no reason to believe that Tigers will not do well.




Sunday 6th October 2013

Gloucester v Exeter 14:00 BT Sports
Gloucester's woes in the front 5 continue with further injuries to key players and now a 4 week suspension for Koree Britton. England fans will be desperate to see Ben Morgan appear and play well, while I am hoping we may actually get a chance to see Kvesic playing at openside. Odd sare though that Kalamafoni will start at 8 and Kvesic will be the 6.
It took Exeter 20 minutes to start playing last Sunday - and that is always a bad idea against the champions. They had some high scoring matches against Glaws last season, and BT will be hoping it is a free flowing game after a couple of more physical showings on their new Sports channel. Exeter have the ability to win, and will surely get a rocket up the arse from rob Baxter. thing is though they were let down by basic skills in the second half last Sunday. so many opportunities wasted by an inability to pass to a man or catch the ball.

Just got around to watching the saints tigers game. Usual off the ball stuff from saints again. I see Hartley hasn't learnt his lesson from last time with Doyle saying "i'll choose not to hear that number 2". T. Youngs completely outplayed him too, even bettering him in the lineout.

God Gloc look awful. Pish front 5, amazed they didn't try and sort it. Hudson is a good lineout operator but offers naff all else.

Ewers though...wow. If Morgan isn't careful he's going to find himself 3rd choice. Great see an EQ qualified number 8 demonstrate both power and a work-rate.

12-29 final score. A deserved win for Exe.

They shoot up from 11th to 6th and Glaws drop to 10th with Wasps dropping to 11th

Agree, what is with Gloucester?  They look good against Saints and poor here?
I simply do not understand this club.  The score against other clubs would have been worse.
And with 4 or 5 minutes to go, why were some fans singing La Marseillaise?  Weird.

Hood83 wrote:God Gloc look awful. Pish front 5, amazed they didn't try and sort it. Hudson is a good lineout operator but offers naff all else.

Ewers though...wow. If Morgan isn't careful he's going to find himself 3rd choice. Great see an EQ qualified number 8 demonstrate both power and a work-rate.

I did not realise Ewers was an EQP. Based on residence?

Gloucester were very poor there today. On the plus side I thought the ref had a good game and was well supported by the TJ's and TMO.

LondonTiger wrote:

Hood83 wrote:God Gloc look awful. Pish front 5, amazed they didn't try and sort it. Hudson is a good lineout operator but offers naff all else.

Ewers though...wow. If Morgan isn't careful he's going to find himself 3rd choice. Great see an EQ qualified number 8 demonstrate both power and a work-rate.

I did not realise Ewers was an EQP. Based on residence?

Looking at the Exeter web site he is Zimbabwean born but he has been through the Exeter academy in Ivybridge - so I would guess he certainly qualifies on residence if not through relations.

Hes an absolute animal! Been behind Richie Baxter up until now which is why he's seemingly burst onto the scene, he's been on loan at The Cornish Pirates and been playing in the A league! Can also play at 6!

If he was an All Black,Aussie or Welsh they would put him in the squad to develop! Knowing England we will put him in the Saxons for 3 years, cap him when he's 26 and decide he's over the hill after 2 years of bench appearances at 28

I remember reading somewhere that he left Zimbabwe to live with his grandparents and study at Ivybridge. Either way, I think he has been here a good long time.

Since he was 14 so 9 years....

We need to get him involved sooner rather than later, he's got a great all round game.

Over the last couple of days we've had two England/ Saxons no.8's outplayed by their opposite numbers (Ewers vs. Morgan & Crane vs Sam Dickinson). Maybe the no.8 stocks aren't as low as we thought?

Crane should be nowhere near an England shirt for me Cumbrian, such an average player

True, I included him because he is in the Saxons at the moment.

With modern forward backs getting bigger and bigger I think there is a case for Ewers Vunipola Morgan and Dickinson to all be included, Ewers and Vunipola both have played 6 this season and Dickinson deserves to be there as well, Gloucesters tight 5 arnt giving Morgan any kind of ball,

Lack of a true 7 is more worrying

Packs not Backs

Thinking about it, I'm not so sure 7 is more worrying than 8. If (should probably be when) Morgan gets injured that will leave Billy Vunipola as first choice (he's barely played international rugby). The back up will then either have never played international rugby, not be good enough (Crane or Waldrom) or *shudder* Tom Wood.

As much as Ewers was outstanding he didn't seem to play 8 in the scrum much, I wonder what his control is like?

Similar with Billy V, he isn't the most technical 8 about.

6. Ewers
7. Robshaw/Wood
8. Billy V

Is a seriously powerful unit going forward (early days of course)

doctor_grey wrote:Agree, what is with Gloucester?  They look good against Saints and poor here?
I simply do not understand this club.  The score against other clubs would have been worse.
And with 4 or 5 minutes to go, why were some fans singing La Marseillaise?  Weird.

The song is 'he knocked it on' to the tune of the French anthem.

Good win for Exe that, pretty worrying from an England point of view how their young talent isn't clicking at all. Ewers is a big lump, wouldn't complain if he had some time in the England squad to pick up some experience.

Phew, not a complete performance but much improved. Pack dominated from the get go, and backs actually looked like they'd met before this game! Let's hope we continue the improvement

Bathman, do you mean Exe's youngsters, or Glaws'? Sounds like Glaws were not at their best today, but the win is important for Exe before Heino action starts. Great to see Ewers rampaging. Filling Richie Baxter's boots was never going to be easy, but it's impressive how the young man has stepped up and beaten off competition from Kai Horstmann and James Phillips. Long may his development continue

Good result for Chiefs ... Surprised by Glaws so far this season, if they hadn't been rescued by Mr Fox against Saints they'd be 0 from 3 at home so far.

I knew Hamilton would be a loss for Gloucester but their tight five look genuinely lost without him. Add to that Kvesic and his inability to judge when the referee isn't looking, such silly penalties conceded.

AsLongAsBut100ofUs wrote:Bathman, do you mean Exe's youngsters, or Glaws'? Sounds like Glaws were not at their best today, but the win is important for Exe before Heino action starts. Great to see Ewers rampaging. Filling Richie Baxter's boots was never going to be easy, but it's impressive how the young man has stepped up and beaten off competition from Kai Horstmann and James Phillips. Long may his development continue

Sorry yes I mean the Gloucester boys, especially when Burns, 12trees, Morgan and Kvesic are seen as England 1st choices by some.

Good win for your boys, far better performance than the Leicester game. Fingers crossed for a few good results in Europe. I think the league table will be tight this year from 4th down to 9th so momentum will be crucial.

How old is Ewers? Didn't catch any of the game, how does young Nowell look this season

BamBam wrote:How old is Ewers? Didn't catch any of the game, how does young Nowell look this season

Ewers is 22, coming up 23. Nowell hasn't featured this season - knee injury

Asbo, a well and truly deserved victory for your lot and as always your fans were good value  

Sam, I'm not sure Hamilton is that big of a loss as he didn't actually play that much. The big issue for us is too many of the front 5 are underperforming. Savage hasn't hit the heights he is capable of; Dawiduik isn't the player we hoped he'd be and Harden has gone back alarmingly. I remember having a chat with you 2 years ago saying that Harden could be a genuine challenger for Cole - that statement is now laughable. Unfortunately Knight has failed to come on yet, due largely to a number of niggly injuries, so we desperately need a decent TH.

I feel now this season will probably be a disappointment for us. As has been well publicised we have a boat load of players out of contract this year and it is time we let a few players go to concentrate on getting a front 5 that can compete. I wouldn't be surprised if Qera and Cowan leave to free up some cash; even perhaps one of Sharples and Sinbad, although I feel that would be a mistake. At some stage a decision will have to be made about Olly Morgan, but he'll be taking up a good chunk of the salary cap too. Therefore, I feel we need to publically say we still have aspirations fopr top 4 this year, but realistically we just need to get top 6 or win the LV; focus on getting game time to our promising youngsters and amke sure we have a truly competitive side for next year.

Can you tell I'm a bit disheartened?  

Who is this Dickinson chap? The big no.8 for Saints... Is he EQ? or an Import

propdavid_london wrote:Who is this Dickinson chap?  The big no.8 for Saints... Is he EQ?  or an Import

EQ, I believe, came from the Championship (Rotherham?) at the beginning of last season, but spent much of it injured

Yeah,
He is EQ.  A late developer.  A lot of late developers can flatter a bit so we should let's see how he gets on.  But he is doing incredibly well.  And providing a lot of on-pitch leadership, a big plus.   Not acting as if he is simply happy to be here.

In regards to Ewers and Dickinson I think we have to see how they do in the next few games before electing them the next big thing in English rugby....

Good start for Dickinson especially though.

Soon we'll be playing "name the actual England born players in the England team. "

Don't forget Haskell aswell...or is he a back up now.

Yea it's only been a few games, and if there's one trend this season so far it's that almost every team seems to be able to go from amazing to incompetent in a week (except for a few).

Well done LI.

I've just forced myself to watch the game and you deserved the win. We were probably at our worst that we've been in a very long time. Oh well. How are the Scarlets doing any one?

I'm unconvinced with Dickinson although he's started well.

Ewers seems a beast with a brain, whilst Billy V just a beast(although a big one).

Both have bags of potential.

Sgt_Pooly wrote:I'm unconvinced with Dickinson although he's started well.

Ewers seems a beast with a brain, whilst Billy V just a beast(although a big one).

Both have bags of potential.

Don't you think that every season we have a few guys who seem to come from nowhere and show up well? So far, both Ewers and Dickinson look real good. But its only 5 games, and we have a long way to go. Hopefully, both continue their run of form.

Yea it's always the case, it's fun trying to spot the next big thing though.

Sgt_Pooly wrote:I'm unconvinced with Dickinson although he's started well.

Ewers seems a beast with a brain, whilst Billy V just a beast(although a big one).

Both have bags of potential.

The big issue for me is these players need to be looking at Read and seeing how they can be that player. The biggest problem re that is he has an unbelievable engine and he rarely makes mistakes. At the moment, I could see BV, Morgan and Ewers all physically getting on top of him through extra power...but it's for about 10 minutes. The rest of the match, his work-rate bosses them.

I do wonder if when playing him we have to accept that we have two 8s playing for 45 mins each at full tilt, because given their natural sizes I can't see any of our guys getting close to his conditioning. I know, that sounds a bit bonkers.

Ewers isn't as physical as Billy V or Morgan but he is closer to that description of Read than any other option we have. He is definitely an 80 minute player.

Also Kvesic covers 8

Brilliant or however Reid is I dont want a carbon copy. I just occasionally want a player that everyone else thinks they want one like that

Kvesic was also pretty poor and gave away a couple of daft kickable penalties vs Exeter. He needs to learn to be a little cuter in his under hand cheating, currently he's just not savvy enough. Only Louis Deacon beats him on brain fart of the weekend for his dumb yellow card for shouting at JP Doyle.

So how are people feeling about where their teams are after the opening 5 rounds?

I am pretty happy with how things have gone for us to be honest. We never expected to beat Saracens and knew that Bath away was going to be a tough one. We have improved defensively on last season and are scoring tries. The only real negative for us is throwing away the lead against Exeter a couple of weeks back, and had we have seen that game out we would now be in 6th pace on 12 points.

Being 8th with 9 points I am happy with though, given how we started last season. Having Skivs back is massive for us, and him and Gough in the engine room were top drawer against Quins. Massive game in round 6 for us up at Kingston Park, which if we can win will give us huge belief that we can stay out of the relegation scrap this year.

Falcons are a safe 7/10, doing ok but could do better.

- Very happy with the deserved wins away to Sale and Worcester
- Disappointed with the loss to Gloucester after being in the lead for large parts of the game, we need to win those games
- Happy to forget about the losses to Bath(wake up call) and Tigers (Rested players)

We've had 3 retirements in the backline since the start of the season so I'd expect Deano to bring in some quality at centre and wing soon, we need it.

Wasps - well again doing ok but could do better to. The league is very competitive this year & we were never going to compete with the high rollers.
But for the width of a post we could exchange positions with Quins. Considering our precarious position a couple of years back we have a solid pack now but just need to convert those close losses to wins which I think we will.
We have been unlucky with injuries Massi,Haskell,Palmer,Sam Jones,Tom Varndell,Southwell,Joe Simpson, Swainston,Bailey,Pitman were all unavailable at the weekend which would hurt many sides.

Reality is we are second bottom & need to start collecting the Ws.

4/10. Not firing and lost to Irish. Could have lost to Wasps. However, I thought we could have beaten Saints as well and Irish, and it's early days. In reality we are only 1 win behind the top 4

6/10 for Exe, tbh - one swallow does not make a summer, yet! (and all sorts of other pap cliches!) But, we're moving in the right direction, the groundwork has been done, and performances will eventually come. Some of our youngsters have really stepped up, Slade is waiting for his chance in the wings and we'll have Nowell back soon - v happy with their progress

I'd give Bath a 7/10. In terms of league position, I would be very pleased if the season ended with us in 4th. But performance wise, aside from the 1st halves of the Leicester and Irish games, we have looked a bit poor. I'm still not entirely convinced about the coaching balance either. All in all, plenty to work on but at least we are in the right part of the table.

Very pleased. Think there is still room for improvement but have come through the 1st 5 rounds relatively comfortably. 5 wins without yet putting in a full 80 minute performance in my opinion. Have not yet faced Tigers or Saints which in all likelihood will be the biggest threats in the league. It's a marathon not a sprint -so far we are in a nice position but we need to make sure we're peaking for the business end.

Bathman_in_London wrote:I'd give Bath a 7/10. In terms of league position, I would be very pleased if the season ended with us in 4th. But performance wise, aside from the 1st halves of the Leicester and Irish games, we have looked a bit poor. I'm still not entirely convinced about the coaching balance either. All in all, plenty to work on but at least we are in the right part of the table.

True, but at least know we are winning games and picking up LBP when playing badly, a bonus from last year. Introduction of Louw will be huge for us, the Sale game showed how much we missed him, Orlandi and Guinaza depth desperately needed up front, when Wilson and/or James go off, we struggle and with Webber out for a bit as well now. Agulla will add even more power and sparkle to the back three, although, I'd be tempted with him or Roko at 13, with JJ in poor form, but maybe about to be away with England anyway. Looking forward to:

James-Webber-Wilson
Attwood-Day
Garvey-Houston-Louw

Stringer-Ford
Eastmond-Roko
Agulla-Watson-Banahan

Catt, Guinaza, Orlandi, Hooper, Fearns, Roberts, Heathcote, Bendy

3/10 for Quins. Nothing like the team we know we can be. Our attack is non existant, the forwards are struggling to compete and out set piece is disastrous at times. Yes we've got some wins and competed with the top two that we've played but in reality it's no where near good enough.

I'm not Triangulation and not normally a glass half empty guy but at the moment there are serious problems and compared to how good we have been we're just massively under performing. What's most annoying is that a few key issues were highlighted by just about every fan pre season. Namely the pack lacking ballast and not replacing the departing players well enough. This hasn't been dealt with for what ever reason and that's what's most worrying.

Hopefully we'll get a lot better as the season progresses, but without a competitive pack the winter cold be very long and cold for us...