Glasgow and Edinburgh 21st Century Banter

First topic message reminder :

Something is going on this year

Both Glasgow and Edinburgh are playing quite well!

Is it a dream, am I imagining it, am I going to wake up in a cold sweat and find out that we are really cr*p again?

Someone please reassure me!!

How much mayhem will he celebrate with tomorrow?

While Mr Anonymous celebrates another 3 years as a Luvvie by doing nothing in a really slow and ineffectual, but somehow potentially great, cameo of what a second row should be.

It's a Christmas miracle! One of the greatest Warriors ever deciding to give us two more years of this:



Still, Edinburgh fans can look forward to more of the Alloa Menace's brooding stare. Ooooh scary.

Leinster really should have tackled him! Twice!

But that was un utterly outstanding run which Niko could have finished himself but the sensible thing was to give the pass to grigg. Niko being sensible - Miracles happen.

Two more years for Scott Cummings as well.

Santa just keeps on giving!

https://twitter.com/pauleddison/status/1076543888196816896?s=19

Oh Finn 

(They did score 64 points though)

Wow, that pass was never on!

Zander signs up for another 3 years.

That removes some (but not very much) of the gloom of yesterday!

If we learnt one thing in that game, it is that we really need a strong prop and ZF is the best we have and should keep on getting better.

The Warriors fans get their Xmas present with a Christmas day signing of Huw Jones for another two seasons.

He kept us hanging on, but got there in the end.

Merry Xmas everyone

Merry Christmas you bunch of legends.

Merry Christmas to all.

Merry Christmas folks. Hope Santa was good to you all.

Greg Peterson moves on from Glasgow to play for Bordeaux with immediate effect.

That is the second lock we have off loaded mid season, after Big Brian. I guess it confirms what we already knew that Bob Harley is now officially a second row and with Swinson and mcDonald now back to fitness, we are not that badly stacked in that department.

We never really saw a lot of Peterson in a Glasgow shirt, always struggled for game time and had a few injuries as well.

Good luck to him in France. It is good to see the Glasgow coaching staff let players who won't be staying move on as soon as they get an offer as well.

Merry Christmas to you lunatics and happy hogmanay when it comes.

Well done to Edinburgh in the last game incidentally.

Murray McCallum signs a 2 year deal with Edinburgh. Surprisingly he's not had much of a lookin since the AIs but a 2 year deal suggests he's firmly part of Cockerill's plans. I'm sure he'll get plenty gametime over the 6N.

McCallum may actually be suffering from his versitility! He was a Loosehead now a Tighthead. He may yet end up being that poor sod that travels around with Scotland in the 6Ns as the emergency front row cover for last minute injuries!

Dave Rennie signs on for another year. I posted that on the 1872 thread, but probably more appropriate here.

so many bloody threads I've done the same thing as biggee. Andrew Mitchell is playing for falcons academy this weekend

https://www.scotsman.com/sport/rugby-union/scotland/scotland-skipper-john-barclay-to-miss-start-of-six-nations-1-4852193

Don't think we'll be seeing Barclay this 6N. Better news on the Glasgow players though.

Well Glasgow committing harakiri tightens things up in A more than it was already. Ospreys currently beating the Bloos to stay in the hunt but Connacht vs Munster Derby is even spicier as a win puts Munster top. If Glasgow don’t come out of the European fixtures with some fire in their bellies and the games during the six nations prove unkind this could be a season to forget.

Edinburgh sitting 2nd. Glasgow sitting second.

Remember the old days. The magners league? When Edinburgh were consistently far better than Glasgow? Looks like the tide is starting to turn folks  

Am I getting ahead of myself? Yup
Do I care? Nope
Looking forward to the natural order returning

tigertattie wrote:Edinburgh sitting 2nd. Glasgow sitting second.

Remember the old days. The magners league? When Edinburgh were consistently far better than Glasgow? Looks like the tide is starting to turn folks  

Am I getting ahead of myself? Yup
Do I care? Nope
Looking forward to the natural order returning

Gies some of what you’re drinking please!

Can someone who has been watching the last 3 Weegie games offer some insight as to what the fork is going on at the moment?

If this doesn't get better, I'll need to start watching Ayr again just to get used to seeing victories.

Or Edinburgh.

Given Hastings' confidence crisis, and the high pressure environment of the 6N, I wonder if chunky Weir is our best bench option?

Let's face it Russell isn't going to be subbed off, so our backup 10 will only be an in case of emergency (or needing a dropgoal) option!

George Carlin wrote:Can someone who has been watching the last 3 Weegie games offer some insight as to what the fork is going on at the moment?

If this doesn't get better, I'll need to start watching Ayr again just to get used to seeing victories.

Or Edinburgh.

George, let me attempt to sum it all up. It looks just like the collective loss of form/belief that we saw last season. If you remember, the armchair warriors all blamed it on DR's "flog them till they drop" selection policy. On today's Glasgow Warriors Forum someone is screaming that it's "all that chopping and changing" that's to blame. Also, last season they said we looked good till we played decent sides. But we've lost to the Luvvies and the slightly less awful Italian side.
My head was hurting so I took young Pipetto to his football this morning. He scored again: three in a match and a half since his lung collapsed Midway through the match Schiz texted me to say he was "in Venice and on my way to see the Tintorettos."

I think it's the End Of Days.

Hard to deny that Duncy is playing well at the moment.

I'd be surprised if he was not in the squad but he will probably keep faith with Hastings as back up, especially if he redeems himself in one of the euro games.

Hastings is exactly the same type of player as Russell. Give him an armchair ride and he’ll chuck the ball about with gay abandon. Force him to try and control a game behind a pack getting bullied most of the game and he starts trying to force things that aren’t on.

Of the Scottish pack doesn’t give Russell a comfy game, bringing on Hastings won’t change that. The conundrum for toonie is does he pick Hastings to continue doing what Russell was (if he gets injured) or does he pick Weir to change tactics if needed.

All I know is that if Glasgow make up any of the backrow, things won’t be easy for any 10 we pick.

Anyone heard news of blade’s injury? Is he back? I’ve not seen scarlets play since they came to HQ

Thing is though, Scotland's best chances of winning is still when we can play with gat abandon, our whole team is set up to play like that, a grinding controlling team we are not.

Everyone is a bit down on Hastings as he has had a few poorish games. He is still young and this is his first season as a nailed on starter. He does need to learn to rein in the ambition sometimes, especially when on the back foot. I still feel confident that he will learn to do that. He may have gained more from the past three games than from all the ones when he was chucking it about for fun!

That’s my point G. Folk are blaming the youngster but it’s the Weegie pack’s inability to lay the platform that is causing the issue.

Yes Scotland need a headless chicken game plan and hopefully the Edinburgh forwards will provide the bulk of the pack and should hopefully provide a platform for the mostly Glasgow backs to do their thing. Hastings is still learning and so far hasn’t made half the mistakes Finn has so he needs to be given further chances.

I do though think we need a plan B for when we come up against a pack that won’t let us play. Weir would be that plan b

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/45860974

Good interview with Ben Atiga - he's still employed by the SRU apparently!

Atiga never really cut it as a player over here, but he has got himself involved in lots of other facets of the game, a lot of which is very useful stuff to the aspiring and actual professionals. He seems to have made a bit of a home for himself over here, good luck to him with these projects.

jimbopip wrote:

George Carlin wrote:Can someone who has been watching the last 3 Weegie games offer some insight as to what the fork is going on at the moment?

If this doesn't get better, I'll need to start watching Ayr again just to get used to seeing victories.

Or Edinburgh.

George, let me attempt to sum it all up. It looks just like the collective loss of form/belief that we saw last season. If you remember, the armchair warriors all blamed it on DR's "flog them till they drop" selection policy. On today's Glasgow Warriors Forum someone is screaming that it's "all that chopping and changing" that's to blame. Also, last season they said we looked good till we played decent sides. But we've lost to the Luvvies and the slightly less awful Italian side.
My head was hurting  so I took young Pipetto to his football this morning. He scored again: three in a match and a half since his lung collapsed Midway through the match Schiz texted me to say he was "in Venice and on my way to see the Tintorettos."

I think it's the End Of Days.

I've missed you Jim.

Hopefully Schiz is behaving and hasn't gone to 'meet someone off a gondola'.

Venice in January is amazing although I'm a Titian fan myself. Great player for Lazio (etc).

Just to add my own Jimbo-anecdote, my own Princess Daughter turned 7 yesterday.

Not really sure where the time goes. How can Gavin Hastings have had children who can even hold a rugby ball? Didn't he play for Scotland last week? Who's the prime minister? I need to go to the toile..., oh, too late again.

Champions Cup match threads are looking for volunteers!

RDW_Scotland wrote:Champions Cup match threads are looking for volunteers!

ya know, it only seems to be us that do match threads these days. Where are all the Welsh and Irish thread writers?

You know what they say - if you want something done right you need to do it yourself!

Plus they like to keep to their own threads - we have more numbers to be able to have bespoke threads.

tigertattie wrote:

RDW_Scotland wrote:Champions Cup match threads are looking for volunteers!

ya know, it only seems to be us that do match threads these days. Where are all the Welsh and Irish thread writers?

Too busy pontificating about whether these are the bestest of times everest for their national teams.

https://www.606v2.com/t68310-toulon-vs-edinburgh-sat-12th-jan-1730-gmt

Thanks tattie

BigGee wrote:

123456789. wrote:

BigGee wrote:

123456789. wrote:The other thing is this will force a rethink of Glasgow’s tactics, so often their moves leave the full back one on one with the defender. With Hogg it’s an almost guaranteed line break, with Jackson it’s a turnover risk every time.

To be fair, it has not been going so badly this season without him in all the big games so far. Jacko looked a little off the pace early on in the season, but has come more onto his game now.

Still he is not the future and is definitely coming towards the end of his career. Tommy S deputised at FB very adequately in one game, but he is 30 now as well and is definitely a better wing than FB.

I suspect we do need a replacement and maybe we need DR to get out his contact book of players back in NZ while we attempt to grow another one here.

I'd imagine that Damian McKenzie is almost certainly intending to retire from international rugby and move to Glasgow following the world cup. He's got his eye on a nice house in the Milngavie area and he's fed up with the New Zealand rain.

In our dreams!

I see my DM to Scotland rumour is gaining traction! Nice

BigGee wrote:https://www.606v2.com/t68311-glasgow-warriors-v-cardiff-blues-euro-champs-cup-sunday-13th-january-15-15#3766585

Just finished my weekend of night shifts this morning and so been vegging this afternoon and catching up with a few recorded games from the weeknd.

Just watched Leicester v Gloucester which was a cracking game and you would have to say that Jake Kerr played very well for the Tigers. He was on the bench but got on early because of injury and was very impressive. Line out throwing was pitch perfect, he carried well, tackled and even won a good turnover. He is starting to look very comfortable at this level as he gains more experience. He may well be starting the two euro games coming up now if the injury to the starting hooker is serious.

If he keeps playing like that and Brown and Turner don't get back, he is surely going to be an injury joker for the 6N and maybe even the WC squad.

tigertattie wrote:Hastings is exactly the same type of player as Russell. Give him an armchair ride and he’ll chuck the ball about with gay abandon. Force him to try and control a game behind a pack getting bullied most of the game and he starts trying to force things that aren’t on.

Of the Scottish pack doesn’t give Russell a comfy game, bringing on Hastings won’t change that. The conundrum for toonie is does he pick Hastings to continue doing what Russell was (if he gets injured) or does he pick Weir to change tactics if needed.

All I know is that if Glasgow make up any of the backrow, things won’t be easy for any 10 we pick.

Anyone heard news of blade’s injury? Is he back? I’ve not seen scarlets play since they came to HQ

There is a third option which is to have Hastings on the bench in case of injury (he does also cover 15 I believe, although he has minimal experience at pro level at doing so but then neither did Phil Godman and that went fine) and move Laidlaw to 10 if things aren't working tactically or the game calls for a more measured approach. Weir is playing the best rugby of his career at Worcester and should be given credit for doing so but he is not an international standard fly-half. Laidlaw has experience and is a controlling (perhaps overly so) influence on Scotland's rugby.
I personally believe that our best bet come the six nations would be to have Hastings and Laidlaw on the bench and George Horne as a starter. When I've seen Pyrgos playing for Edinburgh this year he's impressed me also.

I would rather lose playing Hastings than win with playing the Worcester Meatball.

Almost.

John Hardie commits to Newcastle for two more years.

Hopefully they will manage to stay up!

Nothing to do with rugby, but I'm absolutely gutted about Andy Murray's retirement!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/live/tennis/46834537

Some of my favourite ever sporting memories involve him!

Scotland's greatest ever sportsman to date.

I have lived and died his career with him, some of the best sporting moments ever. He will surely be missed!

Isn't Chris Hoy our best sportsman?

Or one of Ayr's world beating rugby team?

Murray has always been a bit Marmite to some, his really really dull voice always made him sound like he just didnt care about anything when he was talking but he's actually quite a personable fellow.

A few folk said his first wimbledon win was more luck due to other players being injured or off form, but he backed it up with a 2nd win there. It's a shame he never managed to win the Ozzie open with all the finals he's gotten to, but hey, he's not exactly going to be living on the breadline as a pensioner now is he!

Tattie Scones RRN wrote:Scotland's greatest ever sportsman to date.

I think you will find he is British not Scottish....