Kiwi pie you must be a good tactician. I was reading some English journalist and he said virtually the same thing. If you play a high press free flowing supposedly weaker teams can hurt you. He was highlighting how well Fulham do against the top teams who think they can dominate us and how they have trouble with defensive minded lower ranked teams who just don’t give the space to counter attack. I’ll take Marcos way of doing it even though we might get bashed sometimes.%p
middleman
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That was a great win for Fulham
today. We have beaten Arsenal,Man U, Brighton given Liverpool a real fright and had successive 5:0 wins but also lost to Burney and Bournemouth and had some weak draws.
We are inconsistent as hell but it’s a great ride. The Nigerian influence is obvious and Iwobi and Bassey have been great since AFCON. Some on the forum ( which I am banned from ) are talking Europe which is a bit over optimistic . -
It’s the inconsistency that gets me. Two really impressive 5:0 wins not so long ago , play well often against top teams and can’t beat the teams around us. How long before Iwobi and Bassey are back ? Surely will lose Palhinha Tete and others at the end of the season. Was full of confidence when Silva turned down the Saudis and signed a long contract. Still don’t know what to make of the Khans and whoever else is involved in recruitment because it stuck out for a long time we needed a striker of decent quality.
Im still sour and think some of our problems arise from that shitty FA cup game against Manure last season.
Fingers crossed against Bournemouth. Pleasure to find another Fulham supporter. Non in my small city. -
You would have to think Luton have every chance of staying up after their last few displays. Would be huge as they were everyone’s first choice to go down a few months ago.
Like you Dogmeat I am sick of Fulham being praised for pretty losing football. The loss of Mitrovic is even worse than I thought and I think the risk is still there for us to drop right in the relegation zone. I wrote something similar in the friends of Fulham forum and they have banned me for life. -
Luton not Luxons. Bloody autocorrect.
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Dogmeat or Kiwipie do you have any knowledge about the contract Palhinha has signed for the next 4 years. Surely it is just to try and extract more when they come bidding in January.
Fulham should be ok this year I say optimistically just a few hours before playing Luxons. Surely not ??? -
Saudis have ruined the beginning of 2023 season for me. Not only did they take Mitrovic ( although he might have been approaching busted flush stage ) but also unsettled Willian and coach Silva. I really want Fulham to go back to their early century form and stop yo yoing.
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@bovidae
Do you have any idea how much the rugby budget is for some of the big schools especially in Auckland.? We hear some almost unbelievable sums quoted compared with what happens here in the provinces. There does seem to be a major trend for outside coaches with big pasts and/or reputations.
Hastings has played some year 14 students but except for one they were all available for NZSS.
I must admit to milking our success a bit ( or even a lot ) because strength like we have had recently is a once in 20 year thing. No boarding facility is a bit of a hindrance but Napier gets some strength from that.
A couple of other Hurricane regional teams that are missed by many are Fielding High and Francis Douglas.
Thanks for all the information in the recent posts.
Thanks for all the info -
@bovidae Thanks for that. I somehow had Hamilton winning in 2016 and yet I was there watching Mt Albert beat Hastings!!
I remember that Christchurch era as Hasting lost to them in one of the three wins.
My point of the first post was not to downplay the traditional schools success but to highlight that many of our first class players learnt their craft in unheralded schools. That CNI competition is also strong.
I read somewhere recently that from Shield Snorters the school with most first class players at present is Lindisfarne and they haven’t been able to beat Napier or Hastings for a long time now. -
@bovidae
Agreed Bovidae. Of note is that the coach of SBHS until he took over Hastings Boys and got them to two finals was Mark Ozich who has already this season equalled Hawke’s Bays results from last year with only 2 games played.
Although SBHS didn’t fare that well when they got to the finals it was an impressive achievement to even get there.
When you look above NZ 20s it surprising how many players come from “unfashionable” schools or conversely the number that don’t come from the “ big “ schools. -
Now that all the finalists for the top four are into their last qualifying games can I make this observation.
The Super 8 competition is at least equal if not better than any other schoolboy competition.
Both Napier and Hastings beat their Wellington opponents this year to qualify.
Top four winners for the last 2 ( or 3 ? ) years have been super 8 teams. The super 8 has no easy games and half the schools are much smaller than their Auckland Wellington and Christchurch opponents and despite rumours to the contrary there very little,if any, poaching certainly here in Shield Snorters.
I know every dog has his day and other teams will rise but the media coverage even locally does not give enough credit for the quality of rugby played in the Super 8 competition. -
@stargazer I try to block them out but somehow the bastards get through.. I like to hear somethings like injury tests results replacements etc. The disease has spread to the NPC where we get bombarded with useless stats and every try is a great one. I presume this ‘ fan boy ‘ approach is at sky’s behest but surely we know and accept that not every game /play /try is going to be a great one. Plus dont let me get started on the league copying young ladies they seem to have introduced
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Yes and posted in the wrong place . Not too good with computers.
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Re: BLEDISLOE 3
As a fervent All Black supporter am I the only one embarrassed by Johnson and Marshall tonight?
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@stargazer The second XV have had good results for the last couple of years as have the under 15s and the under14s won a super 8 competition during tournament. Having said that I think this team was an exceptional one and we would be lucky to see one of this quality again. Only 700 boys and other competitive schools close by mean it is hard to dominate. No doubt Napier will come back strongly and in yesterday’s Shield Snorters Manawatu game ( at last ) there were 4 past Lindisfarne players and at least 3 ex Napier. One thing in our favour is the quality of our coaches esp Tafi Ioasa.
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@stargazer
Agreed but hard to know whether the score would be 0-0 or 50-50. -
@stargazer
As well as being a piss poor commentator is anyone else annoyed as me with nearly all the commentators spouting useless statistics and comments. Has no one told them that viewers can see and that for them less is better.a -
@Stargazer
Stargazer and Higgins I have followed you both on this site for a long time and love your passion for schoolboy rugby which in my opinion is the best to watch.
Higgins, Napier is always one of our closest rivals and I'm a bit chirpy because I have too many memories going back to the 70s when we felt had the team to beat and then we would go and lose nicely by not very much.
Do you remember the old college day when a lot of visiting school would arrive for a day and frequently be sent home with their tails between their legs after being beaten by Napier/ Te Aute/ Hastings/ Lindisfarne and some of the smaller schools.
Cheers. -
@Higgins
So Palmy then beat Napier in the knockout for Top 4. -
@Higgins
Have to concede that Higgins but they did improve immensely after that. We ( ie Hastings Boys ) have suffered some hidings not too many years ago. Didn't Palmy end up with the Polson banner? Don't want to be critical of any competition and also need to be a bit humble cos who knows what will happen next year. However for 2017 Super 8 rules
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