Castle Grim on a Saturday evening has never been appealing.
By JohnS
November 1 2010
It is that time of the year again with our best players are away with England preparing for the Autumn Internationals, plus with our injury crisis we were seriously depleted. Cole, Croft, Youngs and Flood being with England and Deacon, Harrison, Hawkins, Hipkiss, Parling, Staunton and Stankovich all injured making a total of 11 players not available. Harrison would have expected to get some bench time during November.
Not an excuse just an illustration of the problems we could do without when visiting castle Grim.
For my part I am doing this report from my arm chair and relying on Sky’s broadcast plus the delights of Harrison and Barnes and I really think Harrison is the poorer of the two.
Wayne Barnes was officiating, so in case children are reading this I will refrain from commenting on his performance but recommend adults to read ChrisC’s comments here.
This was a game where we needed the cool head of our skipper to steer the troops through the game and drive them on to deliver our first premiership away victory. With so many missing we need to play to the strengths of the players and look after the ball.
Geordan was peerless under the high ball and as usual his kicking for touch out of the top drawer, his tacking was not bad as well Bret will testify after he was subbed following a visit from Geordan. Having our third choice 10 learning on the job support from his team mates was vital, Twelvetrees was clearly struggling with his clearance kicks having three charged down during the game. Help was needed and with three backs Geordan, Scott and Allen all good with ball on boot so there was help available, so why was it not provided?
On the positive side and there are many with Billy, his kicking at goal was first class with 4 out of 4 and not all easy, clearly I guess he has spent time with Burke.. Billy is doing a good job and needs a little help with his kicking out of hand.
Alex Tuilagi’s storming runs on the wing are a powerful feature of his game. However as we see all too often he seems to hunt down defenders with the purpose of running over them, and usually ends up on the floor with the high risk of losing the ball. It would be more productive if he could draw the opposition and off load or a side step and run in for a try. Would we be better using a player like Lucas who does not have the bulk but does have some great skills?
This week Matt Smith was not at his best which was pity, a solid centre who has proved an able substitute for Hippo.
At scrum half we need to blood Harrison; because we need better competition for Ben, I hope he recovers soon.
So onto the forwards, Gloucester certainly gave our lads some competition however this is an area that Mr Barnes seems to struggle like so many officials. Perhaps Julian will be able to offer training facilities with Devon Cream teas to the officials when he eventually retires. Ever reliable and boy can he push we will miss him when he hangs up his boots.
The second row continues to improve and put in one of their best performances at the line out, although to organise the line out you are always going to miss Croft. The biggest concern has to be at the breakdown. Throughout the game it seemed that the Cherry & whites always got more players to the breakdown and turned over our ball with ease at times. Is this an area for some attention this week at training and perhaps some awareness of what the referee is allowing and what he is not. We need to get smarter in this area.
The big concern has to be the turnover, with Chuter a bit off with his throw ins. Why do we continue with long throw ins which he is clearly having trouble with? When we have a throw in on the 5 meter line it is vital that we win our own ball rather than something fancy.
In a tight game like yesterdays we needed to play the game in Gloucester ‘s half, and take good care of the ball. We did not help ourselves in the last few minutes leaving Billy to kick a penalty up field where he failed to find touch, that was a bolt on job for Geordan.
So there it was a game where penalties were exchanged for 78 minutes and it looked as if we would come away with 2 points. Then Gloucester did it again , a try in the dying minutes but not Bret this week but Vainikolo, do they not know it is Tigers who should win in the dying seconds of the game?
Ah well for what it is worth Stuart Barnes still has his money on Tigers to win the championship so much for the pay offs.
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2010:11:07:21:47:50 by TigerChick.
Will update the site with news stories and reports. Supporting the Tigers fans community
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Did the good lady help with the spelling though ?
Great review though - thanks.
if I did that Andrew 
Will update the site with news stories and reports. Supporting the Tigers fans community
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