Fantasy Aviva Premiership Season 1 - Homepage

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NEWS

Bathite named manager of the year and receives a £20m cash bonus

Fluxy fined £4m following a breach of club discipline. Manager seen wearing women's clothes in the early hours of the morning in Bath city centre, a day before teamsheets named

Wow, quins just destroyed tigers in the first scrum!

Against the head as well

A little taste of Kyle Eastmond there, great footwork and pace. Can't wait to see him next year

Tigers getting smashed here, Croft bounced by Easter, Chuter sat down by JTH. Cracking game here, even Bath having a blinding second half!

Gents, i implore you all to watch this game at some point, one of the games of the season, it's got it all!

Pooly / Driver - pretty safe to say that you're not going to be Sam Vesty's biggest fan after today

Might not be on next week as off to Bahrain, I'll try and predict.

Direct any issues at SJE (he loves it )

Quins - Tigers was a stormer. Thought Flood, Mafi and Allen were v.good. Lowe was better than Manu.

Like a ghost town on here this weekend!

Proper game of two halves, Youngs and Flood awful first half and Tigers' pack bullied, which rarely happens. Second half, Flood was awesome, but thought MOTM was a bit much, reckon Salvi, Castro and Mafi helped turn that game hugely. Salvi is just absolute class! Lowe did look great as well, as did Allen.

Morning lads.

Sorry I didn't submit a team at the weekend, I had hoped to do it Saturday morning but some family issues cropped up. Not wishing to bore you with it so just let me know if I'm to forfeit the game or if predictions can go ahead as normal. (Cheers Flux)

As per the match page can we all predict on Irish-Sarries please. Don't want to see a cup semi decided on default and we have set precedence on this already this season.

Hope everything is alright at home Pull

Cheers SJE. That would obviously be my preference - the results have shown I've been taking the cup seriously. Up to Pooly though.

Pooly is in Bahrain this week Pull so I'm picking up the slack

Cool, cheers bud.

Does Pooly know the race has finished? His travel agent has had a shocker there

Don't mention anything...

http://www.planetrugby.com/story/0,25883,16024_7694687,00.html

A good no nonsense signing for Chiefs, a decent replacement for the retired Peter Short IMO.

Wow, didn't see that one coming. Pretty high profile for the Chiefs. I guess that now their Prem status looks solid, they can take a bit more risk on the wage bill.

Can't see being that much of risk, a solid quality player.

He isn't a risk, but his wages will be bigger than most of the rest of the squad. When Chiefs came up, they kept their wage bill low, so if they got relegated, they wouldn't be in huge financial problems and potentially lose their squad. Now relegation isn't an issue, there isn't a financial risk associated with increasing the wage bill. They made a big profit of ~£4m this year!

True, but it's not as big a risk as say bringing in an older player who is looking for one last big payout, and wouldn't exactly have their mind focused on retirement. He's only 28, arguably in his prime for a lock.

Dude, not saying the player is a risk at all. I'm saying spending money is! Looking at it from a business point of view, not rugby ability.

Bloody race was yesterday!

Just out here for a couple of meetings, net is sparse.

Hope all is well Pull.

Always want to try to get teams in, 30-0 are boring.

It's no Seaton Carew is Bahrain.....

Bathite, avoid the centre of Bath tonight. I don't want to be seen as pretty young girl tonight... (Rugby social = tranny day!)

A point for next season. We should maybe move to having a deadline for team sheets to be handed in a day earlier than tactics. That way no one can miss a game, and everyone has tactics to base upon the opponents selection.

We can avoid the no tactics/team sheets debate occurring at the moment.

Fluxy - probably for the best, thanks for the heads up. Wouldn't want the embarassment of being turned down by a bloke in drag!

Looks like Paul James is signing for Bath, good addition if so

Yeah just seen that, really excited about it. Geech said we didn't need another LH and our forwards coach is also on the way out, so wonder who has seen sense and made this signing?

What would Peoples Lions squads be

Props

Gethin Jenkins , Alex Corbisero , Dan Cole , Adam Jones , Cian Healy

Hookers

Rory Best , Matt Rees , Dylan Hartley

Locks

Bradley Davies , Geoff Parling , Richie Grey , Paul O'Connell

back row

Stephen Ferris , Sam Warburton (c) , Tom Croft , Ross Rennie , Ben Morgan , David Denton

Half backs

Mike Blair , Mike Phillips , Ben Youngs , Johnny Sexton , Rhys Preistland , Toby Flood

Centres

Johnathan Davies , Jamie Roberts , Brian O'Driscoll , Manu Tuilagi

Wing

Alex Cuthbert , George North , Leigh Halfpenny , Tommy Bowe

Full Back

Rob Kearney , Stuart Hogg , Ben Foden


Near misses

Kelly Brown , Sean O'Brian , Toby Falatau , Jamie Heaslip , Donnacha Ryan , Rhys Gill , Courtney Lawes , Tom Wood , Justin Tipric , Connor Murrey , Lee Byrne , Scott Williams , Max Evans , Owen Farrell , Brad Barritt , AWJ , Chris Robshaw , James Haskell , Kieth Earls.


Bit exclusion from both is Chris Ashton

Not bad but think sob and faletau have to be involved especially with their versatility. Probably at the expense of the two scots

Not a Lydiate fan Driver??

Knew i'd forgot someone. Still he'd only be in my near misses.

Absolute tackling machine but doesn't really do much else.

Driver what's your squad based on? Pretty good squad but I disagree with some.

Isn't 3 full backs a bit much?

The scrum halves question really worries me.

Quite amused to see Haskell in the near misses tbh.

Agree with Bathite. SOB and Faletau should certainly be considered.

Toughest to pick is backrow. E.g. Kelly Brown IMO is good enough to force his way into contention when fit.

I'm not sure, I think back three would be the hardest area to pick. We have so much ability in different players, it depends on what style the head coach wants to play.

Can't have Brown in their unless he has a wonder season next year. Good enough on his day, but since his injury, he will have a battle to get the Scottish shirt back, never mind the Lions.

The problem was those 3 FBs as that they can't really play wing as well. I'd be tempted to drop Hogg and you'd still have Halfpenny covering. I'd probably then have Trimble in there, as a physical threat, who could cover 13 in midweek to help rest players.

Also not convinced by Bradley Davies either, would prefer to see Ryan in there or Lawes if he regains some form. Wouldn't rule out Ryan Jones either for his experience and versatility.

35 man lions squad:

Hartley, Best, Rees
Jenkins, Healy, Corbs, Jones, Cole
Gray, POC, Ryan, AWJ
Ferris, Croft, SOB, Warburton, Heaslip, Lydiate
Phillips, Murrey, Youngs
Priestland, Sexton
Roberts, Farrell
Davies, Manu, BOD
North, Bowe, Cuthbert, Halfpenny
Foden, Kearney

I'd go

Hartley, Best, Rees
Jenkins, Healy, Corbs, Jones, Cole
Gray, POC, Ryan, Parling
Ferris, Croft, Warburton, SOB, Faletau, Heaslip
Phillips, Murray, Blair
Sexton, Flood, ROG
Roberts, Davies
BOD, Tuilagi
North, Bowe, Halfpenny, Trimble
Kearney, Foden

This would be my selection.

Best, Rees, Ford (got Lions experience and Hartley is a penatly machine)
Jenkins, Healy, Corbs, Jones, Cole
Gray, POC, Ryan, Parling
Ferris, Croft, Warburton, SOB, Faletau, Denton
Phillips, Murray, Youngs
Sexton, Flood, Priestland/Farrell (Will be close between the pair I reckon)
Roberts, Davies
BOD, Tuilagi
North, Bowe, Halfpenny, Wade (My bolter for the Lions, North and Bowe can cover 13, like Phillips at 12 in the third test in 09!)
Kearney, Foden

Newcastle Falcons to break new ground next season and not play any games on a Saturday with most games being on a Friday night and the odd Sunday.

Does that mean Murray is definately leaving?

Any rumours of who might be leaving Kingston? Gopperth, Hudson, Heeijden?

Murrey is set to stay by all accounts and mentor Tomaz if he comes. Hudson was set to join Gloucester but Richards has persuaded him to stay on.

Kurds is set to give Richards a blank check when we come back up aswell. Alex Crockett could be next into the club.

Blank cheque.....Alex Crockett

So you're not only are you assuming you're going down, you're also assuming an immediate return!

Fair enough, if they can afford to keep them. Always liked and rated Crockett, haven't seen him play since he left us, but before the incident, he was in top top form and think he might have sneak into the Saxons (bearing in mind how low our stock of centres was at that point, with Erinle and Noon starting in the 1st team)

Blank Check is for when we go up Pooly! Crockett is just for the Championship.

That's all he's good for tbh. Pretty much what Worcester used him for

Clever signing really as i can't see Corne Uys sticking about , i think they'll be a clear out in the next few weeks.

A couple of people mentioned fatigue in their predictions which I was suprised about - I thought with the short season fatigue wasn't really an issue..

I think Fatigue is overhyped in this and the other AP game myself. Especially with the conditioning programs these players will be under to ensure there at 110%.

I don't think fatigue has really been an issue in the other game this season driver. Most people rotate and others have recognised this and I've not seen anyone really pulled up for their team being fatigued in predicitons.

To be honest i think Injuries are a big help in the sense that you do tend to lose 2/3 key players and are forced into giving them a rest. I played Easter about 8 games in a row and no one picked up on it! lol