Williams returns for Force trip to face Highlanders

[Burgs]

Just wish Donaldson would practice goal kicking, we’re leaving up to 9 points on the field in nearly every game. Tonight we would have won by 2. .

Respectfully, this is the old argument of facts v truth.
Facts show that's the amount of points he missed, however, truth is as none were conversions or ending a half, if any one was slotted it would be an entirely different period to follow and match.
It's a bug bear of mine, don't take it personally, but yes he needs to slot the type he missed.

[bootsetal06]

Two aspects come to mind . 1 . If we had played as well as we did against the Reds and Saders we would’ve won ….
2 This was a bottom of the table clash ….. 1 try in 80 mins . 13 points total
The Blues/ Reds game shows how top of the table matches are played 75 points total …

[Tazzmania]

I think expectations after last weeks euphoric win were set unrealistically high by most of us.

The Highlanders were very strong favourites with the bookies to win this one, you could have easily got at least $3.00 on most sites for a Force win.

The Force came off a high energy, exertion match against the Crusaders and then had then travel to Dunedin, not a short trip by any stretch of the imagination and play against a very under rated Highlanders side whose team contain a number of x factor players and some really good work man like players.

That said while we went down, there were some good plays and shape to the teams attack.

Patience and rugby IQ still needs to be built and will slowly get there.

A lot has been said about the kicking, but lets be realistic for a moment, it was the best option.

In rugby you basically have three ways to get passed an opposition defence:

1) Run right through the player (The size of our players negates this option)
2) Pass and / or run into contact until the next player can carry on the play until a gap is found (Tried this on numerous occasions to little avail, and would have made no sense to try it from our own 22)
3) Kick the ball for territory (our best option as ball in hand was making limited metres).

Unlike most I am actually liking what I am seeing and while it can be frustrating at times, I am enjoying this season and what the boys are trying to do and I see green shoots we just need to wait for the flowers to bloom.

[Tazzmania]

Defence was paramount last week and the fatigue seemed to set in a bit this week, as we dropped off more than our usual number of tackles.

Tizzano and Princep were very busy in defence but not quite as accurate as normal.

Special mention again to Stewart (need to re-sign him ASAP), and Rodda while getting back to match fitness after so long out of the game was workman like (he too needs to be re-signed ASAP)

Good match for the props. Santi, Marley, Tiaan busy in defence as well as doing great work in the scrum. Two vital scrum penalties when needed most

[Tazzmania]

Attack Stats:

Interesting to see the finishers feature in the attack stats as that is what we want energy off the bench.

Backline features as normal expectations.

Again Princep (need to re-sign him ASAP) and Horton carrying well.

[andrewg]

Great stuff Tazzmania!

[GIGS20]

Just wish Donaldson would practice goal kicking, we’re leaving up to 9 points on the field in nearly every game. Tonight we would have won by 2. Support play dropped off a bit from last week-getting bullied off the ball again. But some great scrums, pity they couldn’t get a rolling maul happening. Thought the ref was pretty fair, letting play flow, but missing a lot of forward passes.

I find myself wishing he'd cleaned the ruck up a bit, both sides were diving at the ground in attack

[Burgs]

In rugby you basically have three ways to get passed an opposition defence:

1) Run right through the player (The size of our players negates this option)
2) Pass and / or run into contact until the next player can carry on the play until a gap is found (Tried this on numerous occasions to little avail, and would have made no sense to try it from our own 22)
3) Kick the ball for territory (our best option as ball in hand was making limited metres).

Thanks for each of the informative posts Tazz.

In your first post, I don't believe we showed enough patience in the attempts at #2. A clinical approach of going through the phases should bare greater returns than it did, but there seemed a "chasing the game" mentality even when we were in front, trying to make something out of nothing by Phase 3 every time. However, if you are going to do #3, then actually kick for territory, not down the throat of the waiting opposition! On several occasions the Highlanders receivers started midway between Try and 22 and took the last receival just shy of their 10 before attacking, ie Force losing ground with every kick. At least kick for the sidelines or ideally grass in the corner, I don't recall there being a "kick for territory" of ours that didn't have a standing Highlander ready and waiting. For mine, I think we basically kicked them into confidence. The Highlanders were really shit in the first half and should have been put to bed before the break.

The first half with a Force cap on was pretty entertaining I thought, there were good parts, we just seemed to lose our way and you could feel the loss coming from about 50 minutes.
Endorse each of the player comments you made.

Would add, Rodda seems to have a "Backrow mentality" at breakdowns rather than the usual Lock bullock role, his first instinct is to get the pilfer. Paid dividends last week and nearly pulled off a couple this week. Would take a better Coaching brain than mine to say if he should stick to his lane and focus on pushing opposition off the ball with his enormous shoulders, but I view it as a positive until shouted down anyway.

A little surprised at Beales Pass/Carry numbers as it didn't feel like he was as involved this week, however, would think these to be pretty high for a Fullback?

My rating of Horton continues to rise, he was in beast mode for most of that match. I think maybe he needs to get a bright coloured scrum cap so everyone can track the bow-wave of carnage he spreads around the field!

Kaitu'u continues to concern me, gives off a "don't want to be here" vibe, which is a shame as was a great player and automatic starter pre- 2023. Maybe he has stayed the same and the competition has gone past him, I don't know, but he is at risk of a contract extension not being his decision now.

I think O'Donnell would be suitably disappointed with his performance without laying the boots too much. It wasn't SR level.

Overall, the Highlanders were poor.
Any SR team to have not beaten that performance by the Highlanders really needs to have a look in the mirror.
As above, you could see the result coming from about 50 minutes and there was nothing done to challenge the narrative.
I wish I could remember properly that quote (and who said it) about "not even having the creativity to start a fight"...

[valzc]

Feel somehow that the game plan was the same as the Crusaders, however the Highlanders had obviously studied and nailed down on the areas such as lineout/rolling maul, and snuffing out the wingers. Bayley & Tiatia were jumped on by 3 guys every time they got the ball and couldn’t do much, but line speed & passing was so much slower than last week. Kicking down the throat of opposition drives me insane and again unlike last week the kick chase put no pressure on Landers.

[GIGS20]

Would add, Rodda seems to have a "Backrow mentality" at breakdowns rather than the usual Lock bullock role, his first instinct is to get the pilfer. Paid dividends last week and nearly pulled off a couple this week. Would take a better Coaching brain than mine to say if he should stick to his lane and focus on pushing opposition off the ball with his enormous shoulders, but I view it as a positive until shouted down anyway.

Pilfers and turnover penalties were hard to come by this week.

Sir seemed pretty intent on letting the attacking team get away with almost anything and requiring the jackal to hold the ball cleanly with a lifting motion for about a week before he'd even consider it legal. It wasn't inconsistent, it was just not conducive to pilfering a lot of ball.

I was screaming for them to give up on the hands on ball stuff and just start counterrucking every breakdown, any pilfer or jackal penalty collected this week was worth probably two or three in a regular game.

I'm happy for him to get hands on ball if it's effective in slowing the opposition attack and regaining possession, which appears to be the case at this point.

[Tazzmania]

Kicking down the throat of opposition drives me insane and again unlike last week the kick chase put no pressure on Landers.

Firstly the Kick Chase is not a simplistic move and requires substantial co-ordination.

It not only requires players to get themselves into an onside position, but also into a line to prevent the attack making any significant progress in return.

Secondly, I do not think we are kicking down the throat of the opposition intentionally. Our players do look up and try and work out where there may be space, however with hang time and decent players in the other teams they cover the ground and / or get themselves into position to take the catch as they should.

[Burgs]

however with hang time

Perhaps there lies part of the problem, if the kick and chase isn't working change to flat kicks to the corners?
Box kicks and bombs are pretty obvious in the setting up, perhaps an improvement/increase of worm burners and bringing back torpedo's is required!

[GIGS20]

Was gonna say the same thing Burgs. The new offside law make a kicking battle without a coordinated chase into a request for the opposition to run 15m before kicking back to you, making it harder to organise a chase.

If the chase isn't ready, just do something else. You'd lose less ground running straight at the defense and turning the ball over.

[Kernow]

Perhaps there lies part of the problem, if the kick and chase isn't working change to flat kicks to the corners?
Box kicks and bombs are pretty obvious in the setting up, perhaps an improvement/increase of worm burners and bringing back torpedo's is required!

I'm surprised we haven't seen more attempts (perhaps we have, and they haven't worked) for the 50/22. Stewart & Tiatia have managed one or two sublime ones this season, but that's been it.

[Burgs]

I'm surprised we haven't seen more attempts (perhaps we have, and they haven't worked) for the 50/22. Stewart & Tiatia have managed one or two sublime ones this season, but that's been it.

Pretty sure Donaldson has managed a couple in broken play hasn't he?