Italy v Scotland, 22 August

jimbopip wrote:Sorry GC, but you've let us down with your choice of Italian mascot.
Really!

RDW_Scotland wrote:As for your team, Matt Scott is also fit so I suspect he will be given a start.

The Scotland medical team issued the following squad update after Saturday’s 28-22 loss to Ireland at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin.

Loose-head prop Ryan Grant left the field of play around the 44th minute having sustained an ankle injury in the lead up to Scotland’s second of three tries.

An x-ray after the game showed no fracture, with the results of a detailed scan later this week expected to give greater insight into the extent of his injury.

Tight-head prop Jon Welsh left the match around the 47th minute for a HIA (head injury assessment), which confirmed his concussion. He is now symptom free and has begun the graduated return-to-play protocol.

Hugh Blake dislocated a finger in the Test match but returned to full training today.

Hooker Fraser Brown has mild hamstring discomfort and will be subject to further management by the medical team.

Consequently, Glasgow Warriors hooker Kevin Bryce has joined the national team this week as a precaution.

Tichtehid wrote:
I know stats don't tell the whole story but in endeavouring to show that Denton isn't the handless bosh merchant he is perceived to be I looked up the game and then went on to compare the other starting number 8s from the weekend. You can't compare one game with another, but anyway

Denton ran 15 times for a gain of 55m, he passed 7 times and offloaded twice, he made 6 tackles and missed none and won one turnover. He took two lineout balls of his own, and I’m not sure if “stolen on oppo throw” means he won one or lost one that way.
He has defenders beaten listed as one, but there was more than one Irish player made to sit down on meeting Denton’s shoulder. He gave away one penalty and wasn’t carded.


SOB ran 6 times for a gain of 14m, he passed 6 times, no offloads, he made 7 tackles and missed 1 and won one turnover (I guess it doesn’t count as one if you latch on over oppo ball and force a penalty, he did this a few times)
He took one lineout ball.
No defenders beaten.
No pens no cards.

Ben Morgan micro-carried twice for no gain and one pass, two tackles zero misses and one lineout take, no TO

Picamoles – 14 runs for 63m gained, 9 passes, 3 offloads, 6 defenders beaten, 1 tackle 1 miss, no lineouts, 3 TO

Read - 12 runs for 20m, 12 passes, 2 offloads, 2 defenders beaten, 9 tackles, 3 misses, 4 lineouts, 1 turnover won

Palu - 4 runs 5m, 1 pass 1 offload, 0 defenders beaten, 7 tackles 1 miss, 1 lineout won. (Pocock came on for Palu but didn't have long enough to chalk up much in the way of stats)

Picamoles was the pick of the bunch on those stats and he had a very good game, but Denton was next in line, although that one very obvious error is enough to reinforce perceptions of him, perceptions that are rather outdated imo.
On the other side of the overlap that he let slip, he made Cowan's try by knocking over Ross and taking three other defenders out of the game, opening up space for the others to run it in. He has proven that he can do this at international level, I hope Strauss can too.

tigertattie wrote:This is getting nuts!

We're running out of Props and our centres are still not fully healed yet!

Also, the Ire vs Sco thread has been over-run with Irish posts about Earls vs hensaw vs cave vs GC's mildly racist uncle dougie!  - they boys can talk the erse off a donkey! - andmost of the time they are argeeing with each other but still fight about it!!!

Priorites for the two italy games coming up

1. Don't injure any more players
2. Give our returning players game time (but don't injure them)
3. Play Visser and Lamont again. If Lamont plays better than Visser again, Lamont gets the nod. If Visser plays better then the two play again the following week in a winner takes all game!
4. Speak to the italians and tell them its a warm up game and not to injure our players.
5. swap jacko to 10 and Tonks to 15 to see how they get on. It may mean we have Dancer/Jacko/Tonks covering 10 for the WC so meatball could be sent back to Scotstoun.
6. Don't get any players injured!

I really don't get Visser! when he has the ball in his hands he bashes into oppents with little regard for his wellbeing. When he is defending he's a bigger Cat than Mr Bean without a snickers! It's almost as if he doesn't think effort is required when he doesnt have the ball.  He thinks he's only there to score tries! He needs a kick up the Jacksie or he'll find himself missing out on the world cup!

cp10 wrote:Someone on the crazies (edinburgh rugby) forum posted this

Tichtehid wrote:
I know stats don't tell the whole story but in endeavouring to show that Denton isn't the handless bosh merchant he is perceived to be I looked up the game and then went on to compare the other starting number 8s from the weekend. You can't compare one game with another, but anyway

Denton ran 15 times for a gain of 55m, he passed 7 times and offloaded twice, he made 6 tackles and missed none and won one turnover. He took two lineout balls of his own, and I’m not sure if “stolen on oppo throw” means he won one or lost one that way.
He has defenders beaten listed as one, but there was more than one Irish player made to sit down on meeting Denton’s shoulder. He gave away one penalty and wasn’t carded.


SOB ran 6 times for a gain of 14m, he passed 6 times, no offloads, he made 7 tackles and missed 1 and won one turnover (I guess it doesn’t count as one if you latch on over oppo ball and force a penalty, he did this a few times)
He took one lineout ball.
No defenders beaten.
No pens no cards.

Ben Morgan micro-carried twice for no gain and one pass, two tackles zero misses and one lineout take, no TO

Picamoles – 14 runs for 63m gained, 9 passes, 3 offloads, 6 defenders beaten, 1 tackle 1 miss, no lineouts, 3 TO

Read - 12 runs for 20m, 12 passes, 2 offloads, 2 defenders beaten, 9 tackles, 3 misses, 4 lineouts, 1 turnover won

Palu - 4 runs 5m, 1 pass 1 offload, 0 defenders beaten, 7 tackles 1 miss, 1 lineout won. (Pocock came on for Palu but didn't have long enough to chalk up much in the way of stats)

Picamoles was the pick of the bunch on those stats and he had a very good game, but Denton was next in line, although that one very obvious error is enough to reinforce perceptions of him, perceptions that are rather outdated imo.
On the other side of the overlap that he let slip, he made Cowan's try by knocking over Ross and taking three other defenders out of the game, opening up space for the others to run it in. He has proven that he can do this at international level, I hope Strauss can too.

Denton's lack of passing is more down to perception (1 glaring no pass) than fact.

tigertattie wrote:This is getting nuts!

We're running out of Props and our centres are still not fully healed yet!

Also, the Ire vs Sco thread has been over-run with Irish posts about Earls vs hensaw vs cave vs GC's mildly racist uncle dougie!  - they boys can talk the erse off a donkey! - andmost of the time they are argeeing with each other but still fight about it!!!

!

jimbopip wrote:

tigertattie wrote:This is getting nuts!

We're running out of Props and our centres are still not fully healed yet!

Also, the Ire vs Sco thread has been over-run with Irish posts about Earls vs hensaw vs cave vs GC's mildly racist uncle dougie!  - they boys can talk the erse off a donkey! - andmost of the time they are argeeing with each other but still fight about it!!!

!

Tiger, fine man that you are you have just invented a new word ; ARGEEING, the Irish talent for agreeing with someone while still sounding as if you are vehemently against everything he is saying. Excellent work, keep it up.

RDW_Scotland wrote:

Don’t joke tattie.  Don’t even joke!!

cp10 wrote:Someone on the crazies (edinburgh rugby) forum posted this

Tichtehid wrote:
I know stats don't tell the whole story but in endeavouring to show that Denton isn't the handless bosh merchant he is perceived to be I looked up the game and then went on to compare the other starting number 8s from the weekend. You can't compare one game with another, but anyway

Denton ran 15 times for a gain of 55m, he passed 7 times and offloaded twice, he made 6 tackles and missed none and won one turnover. He took two lineout balls of his own, and I’m not sure if “stolen on oppo throw” means he won one or lost one that way.
He has defenders beaten listed as one, but there was more than one Irish player made to sit down on meeting Denton’s shoulder. He gave away one penalty and wasn’t carded.


SOB ran 6 times for a gain of 14m, he passed 6 times, no offloads, he made 7 tackles and missed 1 and won one turnover (I guess it doesn’t count as one if you latch on over oppo ball and force a penalty, he did this a few times)
He took one lineout ball.
No defenders beaten.
No pens no cards.

Ben Morgan micro-carried twice for no gain and one pass, two tackles zero misses and one lineout take, no TO

Picamoles – 14 runs for 63m gained, 9 passes, 3 offloads, 6 defenders beaten, 1 tackle 1 miss, no lineouts, 3 TO

Read - 12 runs for 20m, 12 passes, 2 offloads, 2 defenders beaten, 9 tackles, 3 misses, 4 lineouts, 1 turnover won

Palu - 4 runs 5m, 1 pass 1 offload, 0 defenders beaten, 7 tackles 1 miss, 1 lineout won. (Pocock came on for Palu but didn't have long enough to chalk up much in the way of stats)

Picamoles was the pick of the bunch on those stats and he had a very good game, but Denton was next in line, although that one very obvious error is enough to reinforce perceptions of him, perceptions that are rather outdated imo.
On the other side of the overlap that he let slip, he made Cowan's try by knocking over Ross and taking three other defenders out of the game, opening up space for the others to run it in. He has proven that he can do this at international level, I hope Strauss can too.

Denton's lack of passing is more down to perception (1 glaring no pass) than fact.

tigertattie wrote:well I'll be darned!

Jade Te Rure has been called up to the Scotland squad due to the injuries we're getting

www.bbc,co,uk/TeRure_called_up_to_annoy_RDW/Scotland_Rugby_Union_announcements

IanBru wrote:

tigertattie wrote:well I'll be darned!

Jade Te Rure has been called up to the Scotland squad due to the injuries we're getting

www.bbc,co,uk/TeRure_called_up_to_annoy_RDW/Scotland_Rugby_Union_announcements

That has the painful quality of being both ridiculous and yet strangely believable. Chapeau Tiger!

Scots know how to play, but not win
ALLAN MASSIE
00:00 Tuesday 18 August 2015

VERN Cotter seemed a bit irritated. If you get in front three times, then he reckons you should hold on to win.

It’s a good point, but, as anyone who watched Andy Murray trying to close out the Masters final in Montreal can tell you, getting over the finishing line is often one of the hardest things in sport. Murray managed it; Scotland didn’t. Cotter’s team know how to play good rugby. They don’t yet know how to win. To be fair, credit should be given to the excellent Irish fly-half, Ian Madigan; he was the man who really snatched victory for the home team in Dublin on Saturday. But the difference between the two sides was that, over the last couple of years, Ireland have learned how to win close games, and Scotland haven’t.

Blake did enough to show why Cotter rates him so highly; not perhaps enough to show that he is ready to play Test rugbyStill this was less than a full international, if a good deal more than a trial. I reckon that seven of the Ireland side might be in Joe Schmidt’s preferred World Cup XV, perhaps no more than three or four in Vern Cotter’s. So a lot of players on both sides were competing for a place in the 31-man World Cup squad. A fair number of Scots did their chances no harm.

What did we learn? None of the backs had a poor match, though Greig Tonks’ kicking was below the standard required of an international fly-half. Ruaridh Jackson, after missing all last season on account of injury, was full of running. If Cotter wants a player capable of covering both the full back and fly-half positions and it comes to a race between Jackson and Tonks, I reckon the former got his nose in front. Yet both may miss out. It depends on the wing selections. Sean Lamont, first capped in 2006 and a veteran of two World Cups, looked at least as good as ever, his rumbustious break leading to Peter Horne’s excellent try. Tim Visser had a good match too. You might not want him in the team against South Africa, but you’d expect him to score tries against Japan or the USA. Cotter may well choose to pick them both, along with Sean Maitland and Tommy Seymour, with Maitland also acting as deputy to Stuart Hogg.

We all hope that Alex Dunbar and Mark Bennett, our first-choice centres, will be fit. If they aren’t, then Richie Vernon and Peter Horne can do the job, just as they did for Glasgow in the second half of their last triumphant season. If they are, then Matt Scott’s chance of displacing Vernon as the fourth centre must depend on him regaining his form of two years ago before his shoulder injuries took him out of the game.

The five half-backs in the squad are now, presumably settled, barring injuries, since Chris Cusiter opted for family reasons to miss the training build-up.

So we come to the scrum, and real problems. Our set scrum has usually come off second-best for years now, and it did so again on Saturday. Some look on the now-qualified South African tighthead, WP Nel, to set things right. He may indeed do so, though one has quite often seen him in difficulties – and conceding penalties – when playing for Edinburgh. Of course scrum performance is rarely consistent, often indeed not for the duration of a match. There’s a case however for saying that you pick your two best scrummaging props – and never mind if they don’t shine as carriers. Ryan Grant’s injury is worrying, but the scrum went marginally better in the last quarter of the game when Mike Cusack and Gordon Reid had replaced Grant and Jon Welsh.

The three hookers in the squad – Ross Ford, Fraser Brown and Stuart McInally – are all converted flankers (though Ford’s conversion took place a long time ago). None is a hooker in the old sense of the word – that is, someone who actually strikes or hooks. Nowadays of course accurate throwing-in at the lineout has become the most important part of the so-called hooker’s job.

The position at lock is less worrying. Grant Gilchrist, another long-time injury absentee, played the full 80 minutes in Dublin, and played very well too. The Gray brothers are certainties – fingers crossed – and Cotter seems to see the admirably abrasive Rob Harley as a lock rather than flanker, his usual position for Glasgow. So it may be farewell to Jim Hamilton – for the time being anyway.

David Denton had an outstanding game – though he’ll surely blush when he watches the video and sees how he ignored a three-to-one overlap outside him. He wasn’t running with his body at such a low angle to the ground – a bad habit which meant that he was rarely able to offload or even place the ball for the ensuing ruck. Consequently his charges into the midst of the defence, and sometimes through it, were more productive than they have been recently. This World Cup may be his hour.

Hugh Blake did enough to show why Cotter rates him so highly; not perhaps enough to show that he is ready for international rugby; he made little impact at the breakdown, less than his fellow flanker Blair Cowan. If Cotter is toying with the idea of playing two sevens, as Australia did when they beat the All Blacks in Sydney, and didn’t when they lost the return in Auckland, one would think John Barclay a better bet than young Blake.

George Carlin wrote:Does anyone else think that our best pack at the World Cup could be:

01 Dickinson
02 Ford
03 Nel
04 Gray
05 Gray
06 Strauss
07 Barclay
08 Denton

16 Reid
17 Brown
18 Cusack
19 Harley
20 Cowan

?

George Carlin wrote:Does anyone else think that our best pack at the World Cup could be:

01 Dickinson
02 Ford
03 Nel
04 Gray
05 Gray
06 Strauss
07 Barclay
08 Denton

16 Reid
17 Brown
18 Cusack
19 Harley
20 Cowan

?

RDW_Scotland wrote:I’d rather Radge’s recently-just-given-birth wife played at 10 for Scotland than Jade Te Rure!

George Carlin wrote:I would have no problem with McInally being in there if he can string together two good matches in a row out of the next three.

We have to assume that Hardie will get a chance in the next game as Vernon will look to crystallise the 31 and give them game time for cohesion in the final two matches.

Gilchrist has given himself a chance - he just needs 2 more good games out of the 3. It's very difficult to tell to what extent we are underselling Harley's potential as a lock. Gilchrist is supposed to be 6'8" and 19 stones, with Harley supposed to be 6'6" and 17 stones. What will it come down to? We know that GC can call a lineout and presumably has a better game at disrupting a rolling maul.

Given the size disparity, does Harley's versatility even matter to Cotter? So difficult to tell when you're comparing apples with (in Harley's case) bright oranges.

tigertattie wrote:

George Carlin wrote:I would have no problem with McInally being in there if he can string together two good matches in a row out of the next three.

We have to assume that Hardie will get a chance in the next game as Vernon will look to crystallise the 31 and give them game time for cohesion in the final two matches.

Gilchrist has given himself a chance - he just needs 2 more good games out of the 3. It's very difficult to tell to what extent we are underselling Harley's potential as a lock. Gilchrist is supposed to be 6'8" and 19 stones, with Harley supposed to be 6'6" and 17 stones. What will it come down to? We know that GC can call a lineout and presumably has a better game at disrupting a rolling maul.

Given the size disparity, does Harley's versatility even matter to Cotter? So difficult to tell when you're comparing apples with (in Harley's case) bright oranges.

Ritchie V is becoming a God! He even gets to pick the players he plays with??????????

Weegie Wizard wrote:Squad is up:

Forwards - Ashe, Bryce, Cusack, Dickinson, Ford, Gilchrist (c), Gray Snr, Hamilton, Hardie, McInally, Nel, Reid, Stroker & Watson
Backs - Sam H-C, Horne, Hoyland, Hughes, Jackson, Lamont, Pyrgos, Scott, Tonks, Weir