Heineken Cup Round 1 (Pool 1): Edinburgh Rugby v Saracens

First topic message reminder :

Saturday 13 October 2012
Murrayfield Stadium, Edinburgh
Kick off: 15:35
Referee: John Lacey (Ireland)

Teams:

Edinburgh:

15 Tom Brown,
14 Lee Jones,
13 Nick De Luca,
12 Matt Scott,
11 Tim Visser,

10 Greig Laidlaw (capt),
9 Richie Rees,

8 Stuart McInally,
7 Ross Rennie,
6 David Denton,
5 Sean Cox,
4 Grant Gilchrist,
3 Willem Nel,
2 Ross Ford,
1 John Yapp.

Replacements:
16 Andy Titterrell, 17 Allan Jacobsen, 18 Geoff Cross, 19 Robert McAlpine, 20 Netani Talei, 21 Chris Leck, 22 Harry Leonard, 23 Dougie Fife

Saracens:

15 Alex Goode,
14 Chris Ashton,
13 Joel Tomkins,
12 Brad Barritt,
11 David Strettle,

10 Charlie Hodgson,
9 Richard Wigglesworth,

8 Jackson Wray,
7 Will Fraser,
6 Kelly Brown,
5 Mouritz Botha,
4 Steve Borthwick (capt),
3 Matt Stevens,
2 Schalk Brits,
1 Mako Vunipola.

Replacements:
16 John Smit, 17 Rhys Gill, 18 Petrus du Plessis, 19 George Kruis, 20 Andy Saull, 21 Neil de Kock, 22 Owen Farrell, 23 Chris Wyles

Current form in domestic league:

Edinburgh:

9th Place - Played 6: W 2 D 0 L 4 - 12 points

Saracens:

4th Place - Played 6: W 4 D 1 L 1 - 20 points

Last year's Heineken Cup:

Edinburgh:

Semi-finalists (lost 22-19 to Ulster at the Aviva Stadium)

Saracens:

Quarter-finalists (lost 3-22 to ASM Clermont Auvergne at Vicarage Road)

Oh dear.

Edinburgh blow their best chance of the match.

Why do Edinburgh keep kicking the ball away!?!? There success last year was buily on gettign cross the gain line and then spreading it wide through the backs.

Edinburghs scrum is doing really well but they aren't capitalising on it at all... I can't see them getting back into this.. Especially now they are missing two star players and sarries are at full strength.

Gill coming on for the loosehead. He will make a big difference.

jeez. game time.

Goes from bad to worse, now 24-0 down, Farrel try
Game over, campaign over?

typical Ashton try. Shame for Edi.

Great 3rd try for Saracens... But trust the commentators to start going down on Ashton.

At this rate Saracen's will get the 4th try bonus point

I hope these Edinburgh boys are suitably ashamed. Not even turned up today. Good try though.

Morgannwg wrote:Great 3rd try for Saracens... But trust the commentators to start going down on Ashton.

A Scottish commentator praising Ashton upsets you?


Edinburgh playing for pride now.

So angry just now.

Horrendous

That was excellent support play by Ashton no doubt about it

Oh dear.

4th try for Saracens this is embarrassing, very embarrassing
38-0 down

This is so disappointing in light of the investment in the squad and the coaching staff. In seasons gone by we could have put this down to a disparity in the respective budgets, not anymore.

Alright that was class .

Sarries play the pretty stuff, who'd have thought it?

Wow this is inspirational stuff from Edinburgh. Great team spirit, way to to give it 110%

10 minutes for Embra to avoid being nilled.

After this away bn8s point win Sarries have to be favourites to qualify from this group now.

That was an utter shambles. I'm already on my way home!

Hope Edinburgh are going to offer a refund to the poor 6,543 people who turned up for this? Or at the very least a free pint..?

wrfc1980 wrote:After this away bn8s point win Sarries have to be favourites to qualify from this group now.

Yeah they'll be favourites but they'll probably lose twice to Munster.

F**K Charge Down Charlie strikes again, 5th Saracens try

GLove39 wrote:Hope Edinburgh are going to offer a refund to the poor 6,543 people who turned up for this? Or at the very least a free pint..?

I guess that was why it looked empty.

Charge down charlie strikes to just hammer the final nail in.

That is such a lazy kick. Absolute demolition.

LondonTiger wrote:

GLove39 wrote:Hope Edinburgh are going to offer a refund to the poor 6,543 people who turned up for this? Or at the very least a free pint..?

I guess that was why it looked empty.

Charge down charlie strikes to just hammer the final nail in.

Depressingly that counts as a laregish crowd for us

I'm wondering why you think they will PROBABLY loose twice to Munster? Munster are a fading force on the European scene, I think they will win at Thormond they always do but can't see why it is probable they will win in England against this Sarries team.

Why do they play at Murrayfield though? A full stadium makes such a difference to the home team.

Absolute car crash from Edinbrugh, Sarries have dominated every aspect of the game. Worrying times for Scottish rugby.

EnglishReign wrote:Why do they play at Murrayfield though? A full stadium makes such a difference to the home team.

There is no viable alternative

Absolute demolition.

Shame Sarries do not show that ambition every week.

Saracens have shown why they're the best team in England today. They have totally destroyed Edinburgh. Every time Edinburgh have had the ball Saracens put them under serious pressure, causing them to go backwards and then knock the ball on or kick it away to give back Saracens possession. Well done Saracens! Serious contenders for the Heineken cup in my opinion.

wrfc1980 wrote:I'm wondering why you think they will PROBABLY loose twice to Munster? Munster are a fading force on the European scene, I think they will win at Thormond they always do but can't see why it is probable they will win in England against this Sarries team.

Not only are you a poor wum, you're also Poopie at spelling.

Everyone said the same about Munster when they were playing Northampton last year yet they never seem to fade away. Just my opinion after years of watching Munster.

This is the finest Heineken Cup performance I've seen in years from Sarries. A deserved thrashing handed out to Edinburgh here.

bsando wrote:Saracens have shown why they're the best team in England today. They have totally destroyed Edinburgh. Every time Edinburgh have had the ball Saracens put them under serious pressure, causing them to go backwards and then knock the ball on or kick it away to give back Saracens possession. Well done Saracens! Serious contenders for the Heineken cup in my opinion.

Except they are not - as Quins are defending AP champions.

Quins are very good, but I still consider Sarries the best English side. Just my opinion LT

Saracens thrash Edinburgh away.
Racing Metro beat Munster at home.

What exactly are the English and French clubs complaining about again?

Thats Edinburgh out of the HK, in this group winning home games is a must. Somehow they will have to win the next 5 game to have any realistic chance of qualification. This group is now a 3 horse race with Sarries a nose in front.

Saracens are not the best team in England but they do play a brand of rugby that is suited to the HC.

They soak up attacks and keep the board ticking over, it's a little bit like how Munster have played over the years ironically.

Regarding the group, you can never tell what mood the the French are going to turn up in. They've fronted up against Munster in this game, but against Saracens they might shrug their shoulders and decide 'whatever'.

I always find games involving French sides difficult to call.

Very poor from Edinburgh, far too many errors throughout the game and let a very impressive Saracens smother them out the game.

Few bright points from Edinburgh; Talei made an impression off the bench, Denton worked his socks off and Gilchrist put in a decent shift.

Saracens were always going to put pressure on our set-piece and we didn't handle it at all well, just wore us down as the game went on. Struggled to get a foothold in the game because of the set-piece and constant mistakes, the lack of a kick-chase allowed Saracens to dictate territory.

Ford had a very poor game, Cox was quiet, Rennie and McInally struggled to get into it, Laidlaw didn't manage the game well, Scott was anonymous (didn't hear his name once, most disappointing player for me), Visser barely touched the ball and despite a couple good touches Brown made a number of unforced errors.

You don't fluke your way to within 4 points of the final but there needs to be a big turn around to win in Munster next week.

Can't remember Sarries playing that well since winning the play-off final.

Is bradley's job at risk?

I normally give a positives and negatives summary after each Edinburgh game, but I'm just not going to bother.

Embarrasing doesn't even begin to describe it.

What does Bradley do from here? You can't drop the whole team!

I'm so glad that I had to stop watching the game 15 minutes in.

I saw the best of the game from an Edinburgh perspective by then.

Horrible. Absolutely horrible by the sounds of it.

It was George. In the face of a very quick and aggressive defence ~Edinburgh struggled to execute their skills. They started to look a bit like startled rabbits. Talei (sp?) provided some impetus when he came on.

I know it sounds ridiculous after a 45-0 win, but I don't think Sarries can take a massive amount away from this in terms of an indicator of how they will do in the HK this year.

Edinburgh were incredibly poor - worst I've seen them play in a very long time. Also, Edinburgh gifted Sarries so many easy points through mistakes and penalties where Sarries didn't have to do much - coming in from the side, off-side etc.

Don't get me wrong Sarries were excellent at what they do best, but humping a poor Edinburgh side is just the beggining of a long road. As Will Greenwood said - the HK isn't won in the first week! The real test will come against a Munster or Racing team who will actually play well.

Now i'm off to get (even more) drunk.

I think suggesting that Saracens won't take much from that game is missing a fair bit of what a lot of Saracens gameplan is really about in their matches RDW. They're not a side that dominate another in terms of their attacking gameplan, they're a side that are oppressive and make their opposition falter and seem less able than they normally are, forcing the sort of errors and poor performance you saw from Edinburgh.

I just think that there are a lot harder tests to come before Sarries know exactly how good a chance they've got this year!

As I said it is an incredible start and a great performance, but we need to put it into perspective with how truly abysmal Edinburgh were today!