Western Force vs Auckland Blues - NiB Stadium - 21/5/2016

Cant blame anyone but ourselves for that loss. We should have won by 30 but we let the Blues control the gain line with their line speed too often catching us 10mtrs behind the last ruck. The disappointing thing about losing the gain line so weakly was the inability of the boys to recognise the problem during the game. The solution was to run onto the ball in a straight line at pace. Every forward runner was catching the ball flat footed and our backs kept trying to be too cutsie with the ball by playing second line play after second line play. RUN ONTO THE FUCKING BALL AT PACE. That is how you negate defensive linespeed. Trying to fuck around 15-20m behind the gain line with sideways play wont ever get you anywhere. You need to take the opportunity for line speed on defense away by running onto the ball at pace.
I repeat run straight, run hard and take the ball already in motion. Its not hard, weve been fucking around with this flat footed bullshit for too long. Lets actually run onto the ball, please for the love of god, run onto the ball at pace. Take the line speed away from the defence and stop shoveling shit ball sideways.

I thought the uncontested call was another interesting one, one yellow card and one injury out of 6 named front rowers, surely that isn't verbatim with law, and only any form of issue if both were playing the same position.

I thought we should have been going scrum rather than line out as soon as the card was issued. That would have made uncontested a much harder call for them to make and it would have been impossible for them to suddenly make the call once they got the ball back if they had been contesting for the last 5 minutes

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Originally Posted by FingerTips

Any idea of the attendance tonight?

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7027

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Originally Posted by Jeansyjive

DHP should of had a try in the first half, called tackled when he wasn't.

How unjust does a uncontested scrum because of a yellow card seem.

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That was my thought as well, we were penalised because they had a prop in the bin!

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Originally Posted by Alison

Don't know, but it was certainly boosted by the 100 or so sailors from the French Navy who are on R&R in Perth at the moment. They were an absolute hoot and made up for the very unpleasant weather conditions! Bravo la Marine Française!

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I heard them singing at the end of the match and wondered what was going on, hope they had a good time!

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Originally Posted by andrewM

Were they the ones singing at the end of the match? Did they try any of their Gallic Charm on you Allison ;)?

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Yes and, sadly, no ;-)

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Originally Posted by PerthGirl

I heard them singing at the end of the match and wondered what was going on, hope they had a good time!

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They certainly seemed to! Also emptied the merchandise stand of most of its Western Force stock! Good on them!!

Who did the ruck work against the Blues?

Attachment 4391

Involvements over time

Attachment 4392


Impressive efforts by Adam C, Rusty, Guy M and Ross H-P.
Gutsy effort against all odds by Hodgo. Seeyou next year consistent warrior.
Above average effort by Ben Mac.

Dispite all of the rhetoric I thought it was a gutsy effort against a talented but inconsistent Blues outfit.

Another poor effort from another ref on "L" plates at this level.
This was Jamie Nutbrown's 3rd SR game and he appeared over-whelmed by the occasion and never took control of the game. 2 Yellow Cards to the Blues came too late to make a difference.
Incredibly poor - inconsistent management of the breakdown and Blues offside situation.
Fast line-speed is one thing but the Blues off-side play should have been managed better from the get-go.

DH-P try should have gone to the TMO instead of being brought back to the infringement.
Dane rolled out of the high tackle, was clearly free of any tackler when he hit the ground and was entitled to go over the line.
Don't try and tell me that this wouldn't have changed most opinions re this game.

Have no issue with the Kyle dis-allowed try. Brache's interference simply dumb!

Impressed by the way the team maintained their effort after Hodgo's tragic departure for the season.

Can't understand why it's always unsupported single runners continually taking the ball into contact only 5m from the try line. No-one gets coached this way. Just plain stupid laziness by the players.


Check out the efforts of our lads against the best in Australia from Round 13.

Attachment 4395

Note:
Have corrected the tackle counts to match final numbers.

Attachment 4394

Clearly Hodgo was pushing for another 40 Ruck Involvement effort.
I reckon these 6 Forcies can stand very tall (even Rusty and Guy) this week.

As usual the table is dominated by Back Rowers - plus 3 Front Rowers (2 Forcies) and 3 Locks (2 Forcies).

Only 4 players from this list were in the 2015 RWC squad.
If you recall the Wallabies were totally worked over by the ABs in the RWC Final.

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Originally Posted by Buddha Handy

Yeah we may have significantly won the penalty count and they had 2 yellow cards but that still wasn't enough, it was still worth them killing it everything a try was likely. Should have been a definite penalty try on the rolling mail at the end of the first half, I have never seen anything more blatant!
Anyway that doesn't excuse the lack of creativity in attack

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creativity in attack - 4 times in a row in the last 10, we go to lineout to maul. where is the creativity!?

maybe a scrum? maybe take it off the top and shift the focus of the maul? maybe give it to the back line?

so many choices, but always for the same thing! FRUSTRATING!

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Originally Posted by andrewg

Who did the ruck work against the Blues?

Attachment 4391

Involvements over time

Attachment 4392


Impressive efforts by Adam C, Rusty, Guy M and Ross H-P.
Gutsy effort against all odds by Hodgo. Seeyou next year consistent warrior.
Above average effort by Ben Mac.

Dispite all of the rhetoric I thought it was a gutsy effort against a talented but inconsistent Blues outfit.

Another poor effort from another ref on "L" plates at this level.
This was Jamie Nutbrown's 3rd SR game and he appeared over-whelmed by the occasion and never took control of the game. 2 Yellow Cards to the Blues came too late to make a difference.
Incredibly poor - inconsistent management of the breakdown and Blues offside situation.
Fast line-speed is one thing but the Blues off-side play should have been managed better from the get-go.

DH-P try should have gone to the TMO instead of being brought back to the infringement.
Dane rolled out of the high tackle, was clearly free of any tackler when he hit the ground and was entitled to go over the line.
Don't try and tell me that this wouldn't have changed most opinions re this game.

Have no issue with the Kyle dis-allowed try. Brache's interference simply dumb!

Impressed by the way the team maintained their effort after Hodgo's tragic departure for the season.

Can't understand why it's always unsupported single runners continually taking the ball into contact only 5m from the try line. No-one gets coached this way. Just plain stupid laziness by the players.


Check out the efforts of our lads against the best in Australia from Round 13.

Attachment 4393

Attachment 4394

Clearly Hodgo was pushing for another 40 Ruck Involvement effort.
I reckon these 6 Forcies can stand very tall (even Rusty and Guy) this week.

As usual the table is dominated by Back Rowers - plus 3 Front Rowers (2 Forcies) and 3 Locks (2 Forcies).

Only 4 players from this list were in the 2015 RWC squad.
If you recall the Wallabies were totally worked over by the ABs in the RWC Final.

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You obviously work hard on your stats but once again they are being used to paint a picture that isnt there. Your stats would be a more accurate reflection of the game and its trends if it included:
1: Carries per player
2: Gain line success percentages
3: Defenders beaten
4: Offloads to advantage
5: Line Breaks
6: Metres gained

Your stats show me that we do have hard working players but most of this hard work is being done in negative situations. At no point do your statics state the bleeding obvious that we had absolutely no gain line success from our ball carriers to get us going forward. We spent the majority of the game playing behind our last phase. The point about the blues being offside is wrong. That doesnt come into the equation regarding why we lost the gain line. You have to adapt to the ref and what is happening in front of you to find the solution to overcome these things during a match. We lost the gain line because we did not run onto the ball at pace. Instead of running onto the ball and catching the ball 1 to 2 metres from the collision point and using momentum gained from getting a run up to win the gain line we consistently received the ball flat footed 5 to 7 metres behind the gain line and were easily tackled behind our last gain line position. Then we gave negative ball to a backline playing even further behind the gain line.
At the end of the day we played backwards rugby instead of copying what the Blues forwards did when they carried. Win the gain line with strong aggressive carries with momentum to generate attacking situations to trouble the defence. There was a huge difference in this area of the game compared to what our forwards did against the Sunwolves.
So yeah, they worked hard but how and what they did was dumb and ineffective.

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Originally Posted by Kalahard

You obviously work hard on your stats but once again they are being used to paint a picture that isnt there. Your stats would be a more accurate reflection of the game and its trends if it included:
1: Carries per player
2: Gain line success percentages
3: Defenders beaten
4: Offloads to advantage
5: Line Breaks
6: Metres gained

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Thanks Kalahard

You can get all of those stats from elsewhere but you won't find the Rucks Stats anywhere else.

Totally agree that Ruck Involvements are only a small part of the story, BUT, they do show at least which Forwards are actually putting in the hard yards.

I'll leave the analysis of the Backs to other people.

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Originally Posted by andrewg

Thanks Kalahard

You can get all of those stats from elsewhere but you won't find the Rucks Stats anywhere else.

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getting tired of saying that?

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Originally Posted by Alison

Don't know, but it was certainly boosted by the 100 or so sailors from the French Navy who are on R&R in Perth at the moment. They were an absolute hoot and made up for the very unpleasant weather conditions! Bravo la Marine Française!

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Rocky v French Navy at 5.30pm today at Larkhill

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Originally Posted by Hohepa

Rocky v French Navy at 5.30pm today at Larkhill

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That's awesome!! Sadly I won't be able to make it down there in time

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Originally Posted by Hohepa

Rocky v French Navy at 5.30pm today at Larkhill

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Well the whistling kite will make a shitload more cash off their already overpriced pints.