TPN being flown to Europe
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DPK
Peter Sullivan (51)
You're right, he shouldn't have signed with a club that had a competent hooker.
Groucho
Greg Davis (50)
Perhaps, on schoolboy form. But Charles has easily produced the better Super rugby.
en_force_er
Geoff Shaw (53)
Elaborate. I'd be calling up Charles and TPN.
TPN would be used VERY carefully and Charles would become the new A team hooker.
Richo
John Thornett (49)
That is bloody well put.
Joe Blow
Peter Sullivan (51)
Edmunds is a good impact bench player. In the last quarter of a match when substitutions are being made by both sides any scrum advantage is often negated.
Fainga'a should never have been picked. We needed another hooker capable of starting a test and the mid week games would have been perfect to blood Fitzpatrick or Charles.
TPN was touch and go to make the initial squad and Deans erred on the side of caution.
I reckon he is ready. Just don't use him as a back-up prop and do not start him next week. Give him 20 mins off the bench at the death
ya think?
Charles is a proper tight forward, Fitzpatrick plays too lose, like another back rower.
Charles is a direct, athletic tight forward.
In proper, hard games of rugby you need real tight forwards who do set piece work really well and do their job as a tight forward. Only if that is properly done, should a tight forward use any other skills they may have.
You don't want your tight forwards all standing out in the centres planning chip kicks instead of doing their job.
Nau does all the hard work and unbelievably adds dynamic, game changing defending and a solid running game, but only as he does his proper job.
Ok I've stewed on this overnight and I'm still pissed off.
I was at the Barbarians match in Gosford when TPN made his comeback. He played very well at Hooker and went off at 41 minutes with a niggle. Then Pek Cowan went down and considering our scrum was getting smashed by the Poms (8 scrum penalties) we thought, yay, uncontested.
But Robbie had other ideas, bringing TPN back to play Tighthead Prop and justifying it in the presser by saying TPN played that position at club level. To me the idea of bringing back a player on his return from injury who has put in a massive 50 minutes and then picked up a niggle, to join a dominated scrum in a position he has not played in years when uncontested scrums would not only have won us the game, but also be seen as legitimate with the existing injury count stinks of negligence.
Now Tatafu is apparently recovered which is convenient as he wasn't fit enough to be picked two weeks ago but now that Moore is down, he is. TPN is key to our world cup campaign, going raw and not match-fit into a Twickenham match will hardly help his recovery. On past form, can we trust Robbie to look after his well being?
I was at the Barbarians match in Gosford when TPN made his comeback. He played very well at Hooker and went off at 41 minutes with a niggle. Then Pek Cowan went down and considering our scrum was getting smashed by the Poms (8 scrum penalties) we thought, yay, uncontested.
But Robbie had other ideas, bringing TPN back to play Tighthead Prop and justifying it in the presser by saying TPN played that position at club level. To me the idea of bringing back a player on his return from injury who has put in a massive 50 minutes and then picked up a niggle, to join a dominated scrum in a position he has not played in years when uncontested scrums would not only have won us the game, but also be seen as legitimate with the existing injury count stinks of negligence.
Now Tatafu is apparently recovered which is convenient as he wasn't fit enough to be picked two weeks ago but now that Moore is down, he is. TPN is key to our world cup campaign, going raw and not match-fit into a Twickenham match will hardly help his recovery. On past form, can we trust Robbie to look after his well being?
jay-c
Ron Walden (29)
two weeks is a long time in injury comeback... add another 2 weeks and he might be right for the french game<
as i figured tpn was a borderline decision on if he should hav e been taken on the tour> cause players are picked on their ability to play from there first game> no point in taking maybes for the last few games> if he had recovered and fitness levels had improved enouigh in the last few weeks of course he should get the call up
i suspect this would have been on the cards all along as an option and now hes needed he gets the call
as i figured tpn was a borderline decision on if he should hav e been taken on the tour> cause players are picked on their ability to play from there first game> no point in taking maybes for the last few games> if he had recovered and fitness levels had improved enouigh in the last few weeks of course he should get the call up
i suspect this would have been on the cards all along as an option and now hes needed he gets the call
Lee Grant
John Eales (66)
Well said Moses.
Dingo has many fine qualities but he has a streak of stubbornness which sometimes borders on pigheadedness. We knew from afar than he had a generally dogged nature and should not have been surprised that a stubborn streak was somewhere in his clay.
You have mentioned an example of this but there have been others such as overlooking Baxter. This was fair enough earlier in his tenure but when the Oz scrum was in extremis, and Baxter still healthy, he never picked up the phone. Not using some bench players even when run-on players were not performing well, or were tired as they should have been, or arguably hurting, was also plain odd - so odd that we don't know if it being stubborn was part of it, or not; but we suspect it was.
Rugby history may judge the tenure of Deans favourably, but it may also conclude that he had some characteristics that did not serve Oz rugby well.
Dingo has many fine qualities but he has a streak of stubbornness which sometimes borders on pigheadedness. We knew from afar than he had a generally dogged nature and should not have been surprised that a stubborn streak was somewhere in his clay.
You have mentioned an example of this but there have been others such as overlooking Baxter. This was fair enough earlier in his tenure but when the Oz scrum was in extremis, and Baxter still healthy, he never picked up the phone. Not using some bench players even when run-on players were not performing well, or were tired as they should have been, or arguably hurting, was also plain odd - so odd that we don't know if it being stubborn was part of it, or not; but we suspect it was.
Rugby history may judge the tenure of Deans favourably, but it may also conclude that he had some characteristics that did not serve Oz rugby well.
Lance Free
Arch Winning (36)
Perhaps Robbie should also put in a call to Le Fuse to come over and beef up the Wallabies piss poor scrummaging?
Technically, he's our best tighthead prop and is languishing at home while we're going to get belted at scrumtime in every single match.
And who can say now that's he's a 'penalty' liability after Saturdays effort?
Technically, he's our best tighthead prop and is languishing at home while we're going to get belted at scrumtime in every single match.
And who can say now that's he's a 'penalty' liability after Saturdays effort?
farva
Vay Wilson (31)
I guess the big question about this is how important is it to beat the English this weekend? If the world cup is all that matters then we should leave TPN at home to make sure he has no niggle. If we think it important to beat the English this weekend, then reconsidering the status of TPNs injury might be reasonable.
If Moore is not fit to take the field aganist the English, then we are faced with a situation where a very young 3rd string hooker is in the starting side and his back up is a player that doesnt start at super rugby level. Given what happened to our pack last weekend, and the fact that the English pack is better than the Welsh, we could seriously impede our chances of winning. Plus, playing an out of form fatcat and Alexander next to a very young and inexperienced hooker isnt going to help them get back to form. It could dent their confidence more and impede their recovery. It may have been deemed that with a fit Moore we had a player who was suitable to play, and leaving TPN at home to recover more was a decision based on risk vs return. With Moore now injured that risk vs return calculation has changed and TPN is now deemed as fit enough / recovered enough to risk.
If we waited until every player was 100% then we would never field a team.
And I was of the understanding that in the Baa Baas game that Deans was working under advice from a doctor that sending TPN back on would not further aggravate his injury.
topo
Cyril Towers (30)
He's been out injured for months with a disc injury in his neck and has only just started contact training again recently. Not an option.
en_force_er
Geoff Shaw (53)
If TPN has been flown out in a precautionary manner I don't think having him train with the squad would be bad at all, keeping him in the loop for next year would be great.
If he keeps up his rehab we could even see him beat up some frogs in a few weeks.
If he keeps up his rehab we could even see him beat up some frogs in a few weeks.
vidiot
John Solomon (38)
TPN is great, but I think the problem is more than the individuals. Apparently they're being coached to fail.
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