Osprey v Connacht Thread - Sat 27th Oct 12, 14:30

Anyone know where i can see a few highlights i missed the ones shown on s4c
Leinster kicking some ass

Once again we couldn't hold our own up front. We really need to beef up our pack for next season. Would be interested to see Ah You tried at no. 8 but his scrumming doesn't seem to be up to Rabo standard.

Anyone know how Leader did?

Highlights of Match some poor tackling

First up tacking was atrocious. It has been for 90% of the season. We seem to only turn up for the big hype games anymore

another scrum half scoring a try, ok not from a scrum but a tap and go cause of a scrum

theCulk wrote: First up tacking was atrocious. It has been for 90% of the season. We seem to only turn up for the big hype games anymore

Ospreys Fans view of match

Just to comment a little on Connacht, I thought your guys played really well in patches. As with any game at the mercy of Clancy, both teams were disrupted by his unusual refereeing and opportunities to launch a sustained attack were limited. Connacht did however manage to fight well out of the lineouts and refused to get bullied in the scrum, which can really frustrate the Ospreys' offence. Unfortunately for you guys there seemed to be a gulf in more basic awareness and it was too easy for us to make a break or kick you into dangerous situations. Had our offloading been a bit sharper, or the ref more favourable, there was potential for this to turn into a real blowout. Considering Ryan Jones and Adam Jones weren't playing, perhaps that is not so encouraging afterall.

Either way, Connacht definitely showed promise in the set piece and seem to have a good platform to build on. I like to think Ospreys are a pretty difficult team to beat, particularly at home, so it will be interesting to see how Connacht fare against others in the Pro12

Ya thats not whats its about we should turn up every game, i think they go into these games with a damage limitation attitude, looking at the the newish munster side i dont think they have replaced the quality they lost...compared to our team guys not a huge gulf their hookers are naff and white is as good as botha we have buckley, wilkson and loughney all decent, mccarthy is the equal of most of their second rows, i think their backrow is possibly weaker than ours but we definetly need some of the academy lads to step up. parks v keatley (very average) murray and marmion not 2 much between then in centres i think with griffen, mcsharry, mata, and poolman and henshaw we could hold our own finally with the back three TOL henshaw and vainikolo dont rate hurley myself but zebo jones and earls would be ahead. So why is it that they can go out believing they should win every match and are never easy to turnover..there is something radically wrong

More than a hint of forward pass for the first try,
For the second George was hobbling badly trying to cover which left us a man short defensively as play spread wide right.
For Third, that pass should never have been thrown by Parks, I know we're trying to play flat but it was a plain bad decision so near to our own line.
For the last, never mind the penalty at the scrum but getting caught on your heels defensively is a rookie error. Tiernan as senior player on that side should have called Darragh up hard and tried to smash the O's scrumhalf...

The ospreys fans seem to think that they weren't that far away from a demolition job, you have to admit we seem have a very soft underbelly so far and these "mistakes" cant keep happening if we are to be taken seriously as contenders

They could have had 6 if we're honest. We got saved by a forward pass for one and only a bad pass saved us from a sixth. Credit to the Ospreys video analyst they did there homework and found that we're not covering off the scrum. There's a few basic mistakes we're doing that we need to cut out like that. It's cost us tries in the Harequin's game and now this one.

Some awful tackling there. Parks has to take the hit for the 3rd try, that pass was never on. 2nd George was hobbling which helped open the gap. I honestly don't think they'd have scored in that situation otherwise but really some of that is horror show stuff, particularly Walkers run in the 2nd half, he's an elusive player but the tackling was horrendous, they should have finished that one off.

With a number of changes to the side, there is going to be some systems failures against good sides but missing tackles and poor tackling technique gives you no chance.

Devils own wrote: looking at the the newish munster side i dont think they have replaced the quality they lost...compared to our team guys not a huge gulf their hookers are naff and white is as good as botha we have buckley, wilkson and loughney all decent, mccarthy is the equal of most of their second rows, i think their backrow is possibly weaker than ours but we definetly need some of the academy lads to step up. parks v keatley (very average) murray and marmion not 2 much between then in centres i think with griffen, mcsharry, mata, and poolman and henshaw we could hold our own finally with the back three TOL henshaw and vainikolo dont rate hurley myself but zebo jones and earls would be ahead.

.....

So why is it that they can go out believing they should win every match and are never easy to turnover..there is something radically wrong

IMO, it seems that there is something radically wrong because you are overrating our players, and you're simply denying the evidence before your eyes.

Munster have a level of consistency that isn't down to some unknown x factor. The difference between them and us is that they do the basics better. Less knock-ons, less missed tackles, less kicking away of possession. You can argue that some of our players are as good as what they have, but in general they are not and when put under pressure it shows.

Creedence wrote:

Devils own wrote: looking at the the newish munster side i dont think they have replaced the quality they lost...compared to our team guys not a huge gulf their hookers are naff and white is as good as botha we have buckley, wilkson and loughney all decent, mccarthy is the equal of most of their second rows, i think their backrow is possibly weaker than ours but we definetly need some of the academy lads to step up. parks v keatley (very average) murray and marmion not 2 much between then in centres i think with griffen, mcsharry, mata, and poolman and henshaw we could hold our own finally with the back three TOL henshaw and vainikolo dont rate hurley myself but zebo jones and earls would be ahead.

.....

So why is it that they can go out believing they should win every match and are never easy to turnover..there is something radically wrong

IMO, it seems that there is something radically wrong because you are overrating our players, and you're simply denying the evidence before your eyes.

Munster have a level of consistency that isn't down to some unknown x factor. The difference between them and us is that they do the basics better. Less knock-ons, less missed tackles, less kicking away of possession. You can argue that some of our players are as good as what they have, but in general they are not and when put under pressure it shows.

Im not overating, i would agrue that munster have a weaker backrow david wallace, Leamy, even quinlan are a cut above their current replacements dougall, ronan, mahony (overated imo) dont think any derserve an irish shirt but knowing kidney he would probably pick them all, the new backrow CJ strander should help tho, flannery at hooker is way ahead of varley (not good) or sherry (underpowered)thier second row pairing although probably the irish pairing is not what it was but still a force, keately is well below ROG standard (even if he could never tackle or score tries), id say hurley at full back is well below international standard however earls and zebo are better than they had before but still their centre partnership is not as settled as it was with tipoki etc.

So as i said i dont think we have a better team, but in many positions our lads are not a million miles away the likes of faloon, naoupo, parks, griffen, TOL,buckley, marmion, reynecke, mcarthy henshaw would all be keeping their counterparts in munster on their toes at the very least. So why are our basics on many occasions as you suggest so poor? eg knock ons missed tackles etc for many rabo pro 12 games. For me i dont yet expect us to be beating leinster day in day out but you have to expect the lads play to the max or close to the max of their potential for every game if not then imho there is something radically wrong where that problem lies im not sure but issues such as the ability of the coaching staff? and the current mentality of the setup?

For me its a priority it wont matter who we have on the roster unless as a fan i know that when they put on a connacht jersey they will giving nothing short of 100% and that they have adequate coaches with the technical know how to instill the with "the basics" i mean if you sent your son or daughter to piano lessons and they still didnt know egbdf face after a few days let alone years you would be thinking to yourself whats going on. So im not saying its an x factor in fact the exact opposite we simply arent doing our homework or the teacher cant teach or else the pupil is not capable ( which in most cases mentioned they should be)

Devils own wrote: So why are our basics on many occasions as you suggest so poor? eg knock ons missed tackles etc for many rabo pro 12 games. For me i dont yet expect us to be beating leinster day in day out but you have to expect the lads play to the max or close to the max of their potential for every game

I don't think you can suggest that because you can pull off a fantastic backline move once, that doing it everytime is your 'potential'. In reality it is a question of how many times can you do it out of 10. Munster will pull off the same move once or twice more than us out of 10 attempts and that is the difference I see.

The other thing is the scrum - we have been mangled in the past few games, back as far as the second half against Leinster. For all the talk about our props, we are obviously lacking quality there, and we have coughed up a load of points.