Review of ZP: Week1

By PerryGo
September 2 2002

Well, we expected one or two surprises to come out of Week One of the ZP and we were not disappointed. To kick things off, even before the off, we had a change of approach from the Premiership itself: announcing the rules of the competition before the end of the season. Strange…but true.

We assume this is just to lull everyone into a false sense of security – if rugby administrators find they still have a foot left without a bullet hole through it, you can expect them to correct the situation without delay. My prediction for what happens next? Premiership to be expanded for next season to form two conferences of eight clubs each, with the top 4 from National One (Worcester, Rotherham, Orrell and Exeter) invited to join this year’s 12. Thus saving anyone from the dreaded ‘drop’.

Meanwhile, back on the field of play, the biggest surprise has to be Leeds toppling the mighty Leicester Tigers (or, ‘Cheetahs’ as they are now affectionately called on the ComeAllWithin message board, in honour of Neil Back’s ‘cheeky chappie’ ploy in the European Cup final). Two years in a row – well done Phil Davies.

Sale Sharks - or, just plain ‘Sharks’ as they now apparently want to be known (well, it’s understandable - wouldn’t you?) – managed a last gasp win over Northampton Saints in the season-opener on Friday night, thanks to a late drop goal from Hodgson who many people (OK, me…) rate as probably the best all-round fly half in the country. Sacrilege to say that, I know, with Jonny still the clear numero uno for England, but there’s not much between them in ability folks, just some experience at the highest level. If only Quins had Charlie…but more on that later.

Having said that, the irrepressible Wilko managed to pull out another top class display of place kicking in converting 8 penalties for Newcastle to topple Wasps (despite the visitors scoring two tries).

Meanwhile, our neurotic former neighbours, Oirish, went down at home to Bath, which confirms my opinion that the excellent Brendan Venter may not be able to pull another rabbit out of the hat this year. Since Bath are still my tip for the bottom spot, I will assume that both teams are going to struggle this year.

After Leeds, it looks like the performance of the week must go to Watford’s Finest, Sallaries – winning away at Bristol, by a 15 point margin, scoring 45 points and picking up the only 4-tries bonus point of the weekend.

And finally, our game against Glawster. Ten out of ten for a stirring spectacle. Great to see over 7,000 at the Stoop again, and even though the Quins crowd was maybe a bit more subdued than I expected, the support was still good. Let’s hope it’s the first of many full or nearly full houses.

Nice to have the visiting supporters mostly in the North and South Stands too, rather than swarming all over the East Stand, as has so often been the case in previous seasons. Sadly, thanks to the kind sponsorship of NEC, their corporate box in the middle of the East Stand was the exception - half filled with a motley collection of well oiled Glawster boys, enjoying their loud and proud medley of various soccer choruses, specially imported for the occasion. Nick Duncombe was spotted in the box, pressing the flesh and bravely answering all their technical rugby questions (you know, ‘So what position do you play then?’ ‘How many did you say there were on each side?’ and so on). Still, great source of revenue.

And, in closing, a few personal observations on the match.

Firstly, although the man-in-the-middle (censorship restrictions prevent me naming Steve Lander by name) had his usual fair share of ‘…what?’ decisions, he was not as bad as many people (OK, me…) expected. Half the crowd needs to study the laws of the game more – you-know-who was right to stop Matt Powell taking those quick taps, for example, as the scrum half knew full well. Having said that, give me Chris White anytime. In fact, virtually anyone else anytime.

Secondly, I was delighted with the overall Quins performance. We can take many positives from the game, and if we play like that consistently we will win more games than we lose.

Considering the strength of the Gloucester pack, a fine display by our forwards – well done, boys. I was a bit worried during the second quarter, but they came back rejuvenated after the break. The set pieces worked really well, especially when Codling was on the field. Scrum solid, lineout sound. I still think it’s a bit of a gamble running with a largely inexperienced and slightly lightweight second row, but as Fox Mulder is fond of saying, ‘I want to believe’.

The backs – all the same as last year, remember, apart from Williams at full back - were like a different set of players. Credit to Paul Turner who, if he can keep up the variety and creativity when other teams start analyzing our videos, could turn out to be Quins’ signing of the season. I believe that from every one of our set pieces in the first half they ran a different backs’ move (I was noting all them down during the first half, intending to do an in-depth analysis in this article, until a friend pointed out that that might help future opponents more than us…).

Quins’ will be disappointed not to have won a game that was there for the taking. So what do we put it down to? Just the rub of the green – bad luck on the day? A missed tackle on a prop? Certainly, they shouldn’t be galloping in through the defensive line to score from 20 metres out. Jason’s decision to ask Burke to kick that last penalty rather than go for the 5 metre catch and drive? Maybe. To try to hold on to win by the odd point in the last 10 minutes smacks of last season’s slightly negative “try to sneak a result” approach. On the other hand, we did end up leading the match with a few minutes to go, so… But did I pick up on a little disagreement between Jason and Will over that call?

Decision making still occasionally fails us. When Greenwood attacked the line from 5 metres out, there was an overlap on the right side - but if he’d scored, as well he might, it would have been ‘hero time’ so you can’t really criticize that. But what about the drop-goal? We love you Burkey, we do - and yet…was it the right call? There were players available both sides…

BTW, no-one should now accuse Greenwood of not being interested in how he plays for Quins. He played his heart out, as he did pre-season too. I think he’s in for a big season – even if the stock ingredient of every backs’ move bar one seems to involve using him as a decoy runner!

But lastly, and most seriously, we have to touch on the one big negative. Not spilling possession or too many unforced errors, which dominated so many of last season’s performances. Not periods of ‘headless chickens’ panic play, even though we got close once in the second half. No, none of the above.

I am referring of course to the defensive frailties of our number 10, Paul Burke, who was targeted by Gloucester from the get-go, and remorselessly throughout the match. Time and again, despite his best efforts, Gloucester were making copious yards by attacking the fly half channel. I stopped counting how many tackles he missed. It’s not just a size-thing (far be it for me to say he should be able to knock down a 17 stone Glawster back rower on the charge) as it looked like Matt Moore – no giant himself - was asked to step in to shore things up at the defensive line outs.

Unfortunately, Burke’s weakness – not an uncommon problem, I accept, and one that other teams have to overcome too, such as Northampton with Paul Grayson – was compounded by what I guess you have to put down to failings in the back row. It’s their job to protect the fly half; otherwise we’d have casualty wards up and down the country filled with bodies wearing no. 10 shirts. The balance is just not right yet. Hurry up, Mr. Vos – we need you.

The channels around the rucks and mauls were not defended well enough and too many first-up tackles were missed, which puts a team on the back foot, drawing other players out of position and opening up gaps. That’s when a team can look very ragged and the shape falls apart.

I’m now about to put myself in really deep trouble by criticizing the second most popular player (I refer of course to Ace Tiatia) after already hinting at it with the most popular one, Burkey, but was Ace partly at fault for this? He’s justifiably popular as a crowd pleaser, puts in some powerful runs and some big hits. But I’m not sure whether those fully compensate for some of his technical shortcomings in the no. 6 or 7 positions. (Is it just me, or might he not be better advised to wrap up an opponent rather than try to bounce him into the South Stand with a Sumo-wrestler’s hit, as it looks like he’s trying to on occasions?)

Loved some of his contributions yesterday, mind you and he’s doing his best to make a good job of playing out of position. I guess with such a big pack to play against, it was felt we needed Ace out there to beef things up.

One really needs to study the video to see where the errors were being made in defending around the fringes, so I’m ready to be corrected. I see that the press and the message board seem to have awarded MOTM honours to one or both of Burkey or Ace, so I’m standing by for a volley of different opinions!

All of this is not to say that the defensive effort was not fantastic – Quins played with real spirit and commitment and some of the tackling was just tremendous. There are more than enough positives to build on, and I don’t think it will be long before the lessons to be learned from Week One are corrected.

If I was Mark Evans I’d be reasonably happy….until I started thinking about the possible backlash at Welford Road. That will be a stern test, but one that Quins are well able to take on and come away with at least a point – so long as they believe in themselves. After all, there will be doubts in Leicester’s minds. And didn’t people talk about the very same ‘backlash’ from the Tiggers just before our last cup victory?