Northland v North Harbour
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Captain Olsen benched, Tou gets a start..assume Atkins injured given he has been on then bench most other games??
Changes in the backs!! If they work, could be good, but jeez selectors playing with fire last 2 games given the precarious position we find ourselves in.
A few of these changes should have been tried before now.
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1 Teague McElroy, 2 Luteru Tolai, 3 Sione Mafileo, 4 Gerard Cowley-Tuioti, 5 Jacob Pierce, 6 Ethan Roots, 7 Dillon Hunt, 8 Murphy Taramai, 9 Bryn Hall, 10 Bryn Gatland, 11 Tomas Aoake, 12 Antonio Mikaele-Tu'u, 13 James Little, 14 Asaeli Tikoirotuma, 15 Shaun Stevenson
Reserves: 16 Zane Turner, 17 Alex Woonton, 18 Jimmy Roots, 19 Xavier Cowley-Tuioti, 20 Tim Sail, 21 Lewis Gjaltema, 22 Fine Inisi, 23 Jared Page
Mayhew is injured
Heighton dropped? -
@taniwharugby said in Northland v NH:
A few of these changes should have been tried before now
I'm confident Cooper will be an improvement. Low bar to get over..
Gregory in the midfield is good. I think his best position might be further in at 12. One of his strength in 7's was his turnovers.. he has more of a chance to get over the ball here.
Ranger earned his demotion
I haven't paid much attention to Brady Rush. Any good?
Pleased to see Matt Wright get another start. An underrated player
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@Duluth think rush had his first minutes last week, in the period I was sulking and hadn't watched...he is not a winger though...
On Hawkins, I think he has alot to offer the team. I hear from various people (not just this year) he reads the game so well, and when you watch him defensively, he is often in the right spot to make a tackle or take a kick or pass, on attack he often finds a gap but isnt able to exploit it as well as you'd hope.
I have heard he has been running many of the back trainings (unsure how true this is) so do wonder if his future does lie in the coaching side of things, and if he takes himself out of the equation how much better things might run?
I know I have given him shit over the years, the few interactions i have had with him after games, seems like a really GC and seems to love playing for Northland, so if he is able to contribute as a coach, might be the way to go!
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@taniwharugby we seem to have made all the changes at once in the backs. So as much as we were frustrated it seems like the coaches were as well. Hope the young midfield work hard on D and play with confidence. This game will be very interesting 😀👍
The criticism and praise of individual players in a team game always seems harsh but is never terminal I.e. work on changes required, train hard, improve skills, and mental approach to game. In regard to Dan his general play has been really good, but set piece play has not been as authoritative as we need.
Issue I have with our teams of recent seasons is we settle on a 15 and never change despite players not improving and often looking like they have run out of steam mid season.
That said this years squad have looked really good in parts, really physical but have not put in a good 80 yet despite the 4 wins. That in itself is a sign that if they really click they could be dangerous.
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@taniwharugby said in Northland v North Harbour:
@Duluth think rush had his first minutes last week, in the period I was sulking and hadn't watched...he is not a winger though...
Funny
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@kev we also have the 2nd worst attack....
Too much of our play we seem to be set too deep, which is fine if the ball movement is quick and the punch in the mid-field is up to it, but our movement is too slow, crucial handling errors and often no penetration, so when we retain it, we have it 2 or 3 passes along and 3m behind the advantage line.
That said, I think we have created plenty of opportunities (up until last week) but our finishing/handling/decisions making (when not to off load) has been poor.
Defensively, I think for the most part, we have been very good, although as always, we seem to defend too narrow and opposition always seem to have an extra man outside us
Some of these changes needed to be made weeks ago, now we are chasing our tails and forced to make more changes than you would like given the personnel available right now
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@taniwharugby yep
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Humid, windy and lots of rain about...
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Messy
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Nice work Brady Rush
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Will have to watch exits today. Kick is better option.
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Mistake from attacking lineout. Not holding possession on attack.
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NH Prop not straight
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@kev boring in on Ross Wright
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Poor exit from scrum issues and try to NH.
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YC for Ross Wright. But NH never pushing straight? Tough.
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Ref still not picking up NH for boring in.
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@kev scrums are a mess. Someone needs to get in his ear.
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Still frigging boring in.
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Games is a joke when ref is not policing the scrums.
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He is policing them @kev but more like Police Academy policing. His control of the scrum has been horribly one sided. That last penalty was laughable it was so bad
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Also very inconsistent both ways with how long he plays advantage for
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@Chiefy07 every scrum their scrum moves to the left and RW gets turned in. Not even a game at this stage.
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I hate watching Northland games where we play no rugby because we have no possession. Have to sort the scrum and manage the ref second half. Graham Dewes polite about ref.
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Good option Cooper
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Leilua awful drop.
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Don’t take off Cooper
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Starting to get possession but need points.
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That maul decision is another shocker. I'm surprised he didn't bottle the YC too
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Ranger options. Did not have speed....
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Brady Rush awesome
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Bugger. Really poor option from Hawkins.
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Hard luck for Gregory. Tried to pull out so better to have jumped.
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Game lost in first half with scrums. Disappointed the young backline didn’t get its chance. Cooper looked good for me at first.
Second half not good enough to take our chances. Not sure the subs helped.Brady Rush the goods.
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Fucking up that lineout at the end and missing the opportunity to claim a bonus point will likely come back to haunt NH (and they've already got the ghost of losing to Wellington collecting a massive trick or treat stash on the North Shore!).
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Harbour won't be too happy with just 4 points from this game.
They're still a chance for a playoff spot, but it's slim. They probably have to win their last two games with a bonus point to have a chance.
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@Dice Yeah - their best chance is to edge out Wellington, but they need a big favour from Hawkes Bay because Wellington is pretty sure to pick up 5 points vs Manawatu.
And, if they end up tied on the same number of points as Wellington then they dip out - unless there's a third team stuck there.
They should have been a top 4 team, but they probably won't be.
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@Dice said in Northland v North Harbour:
Harbour won't be too happy with just 4 points from this game.
They're still a chance for a playoff spot, but it's slim. They probably have to win their last two games with a bonus point to have a chance.
Completely unlikely but such is the strange nature of the comp this year they could still be relegated depending on other results. Weird year.
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I wont go into what I thought of the ref and his errors, inconsistent and baffling decisions...
Again, we put too much pressure on ourselves with errors, always at the wrong time too, although we probably still made less errors than last week!
But jeez we struggle to score, if we arent throwing 50-50 passes we are losing control.
Great touches off the boot by Wright early on, good outing by him, our mid-field looked solid, I like the look of Cooper though, just looks to have time, Rush was a standout for me, excellent debut start!
Forwards were a mixed bag, our scrum was under the pump (legally or not...) in that first spell, but was shored up in the 2nd...our maul defence has vanished the last 2 weeks.
The usual suspects stood up again.
Both tackled in the air incidents happened on the opposite side to us, but for me the only difference between the 2 was the landing.
Assuming Gregory doesnt cop a ban, I think we start the same backline, maybe only swap Ranger with Leilua who seems to have gone off the boil.
Next week is about physicality, too often when we play Auckland we let them bully us.
