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CAS Rugby 2014

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Ted S

Sydney Middleton (9)
very hollow feeling towards Cranbrook's premiership this year after the dominant performance from knox today, really showed who the better team was

I doubt it, better team in ONE game perhaps but they were not in the previous clash and not the best team against Waverley. Seems to me Cranbrook might just know that this game was not as important as others in terms of the CAS premiership.
Score like that at Knoxs is never a true indication
 

David Jones

Frank Row (1)
I doubt it, better team in ONE game perhaps but they were not in the previous clash and not the best team against Waverley. Seems to me Cranbrook might just know that this game was not as important as others in terms of the CAS premiership.
Score like that at Knoxs is never a true indication


Knox's losses have added up to 5 points (3 v cranbrook, 2 v waverly) and they were unlucky to lose both games, cranbrook lost to knox today by 36 points

While knox may have been inconsistent (and unlucky) throughout the season, I believe today they showed they were the best team in the comp
 

benson13

Bob McCowan (2)
sidelineview.my comments weren't intended as a League v Union thing.I played both codes into my early 20's and then stuck with Union.Both my sons played League as well. My youngest son played for a Roosters Junior club.

I've watched every Waverley game this year and we'll have to disagree on the over use of kicking by some Waverley players.One stands out as the main offender.its not your bloke.

Some examples:

v Barker at Queens Pk (46 -0 loss)
Several of Barker's tries came from good counterattack returning misjudged kicks from the same Waverley player. The Barker players were actually joking about it during and after the game.

v Knox at Queens Pk (12 -10 win)
The 2 Knox tries came after Waverley sent misdirected kicks downfield and they attacked at pace through their backline.Pretty sure the Knox tries were scored by their 2 centres..or the Hooker got one (he's as fast as most Centres).Overall Waves defense was very good in this game.. Knox did get over the line a few times but were denied points.Great win.

v Cranbrook at Hordern (24-12 loss)
Waverley competed really well & were leading in this game but gave vital possession away by poor kicking in the 2nd half.Waverley didn't win a Lineout in the first half .and then won only 2 Lineouts in the 2nd half. So,when you're team is leading.but you're not winning the Lineouts . why kick for touch or near touch especially into that strong headwind ?
Good Lineout ball is the best opportunity for a slick Backline to attack from. Possibly some stronger messaging from Coaches & Captain might have steadied the ship ??
Cranbrook scored 3 tries to nil .and the one next to the posts was from pretty soft Defense.
For much of this game,Waverley were the better team and I reckon if they controlled the ball more they would have taken the win.

v Barker at Barker (19-15 win)
I reckon Waverley left 2 - 3 tries out on the field because they kicked too much.Other spectators at the ground expressed the same thoughts. When they took the line on & retained possession they were able to score the winning try with 4 - 5 minutes remaining.
Barker had 5 key players out and a reshuffled Backline..but still a gutsy Waverley win.

# Waverley should get a tape of the game between Barker 3rds and the Japanese team (Kasegwei ??) The smaller Japanese team won easily ie 34 -17 and did NOT kick the ball once.Not once. Every player in this team were committed to running the ball,wide passing,running straight,support play and great teamwork.Great to see.

Kicking is fine if its in the team game plan and everyone knows when and where on the field it's going to happen...& the designated chasers know when to expect the kick. An effective chase & tackle creates potential turnover ball or a penalty.Everyone has to be on the same page.

What I'd really love to see is the Waverley Backline function more as a unit and back themselves more with the ball in Attack.The young guys have pace and skill & I'd like to see them put into space & showing their ball running more in the next 2 games.




Plenty of misguided opinions here about a Saturday afternoon schoolboy footy game.

Has anyone asked the coaches of their game plan? Perhaps the midfield kicking game is a part of their plan, perhaps kicking for a line out is also a part of this plan.

If there are a few yr 10 or yr 11 kids who have made a Harold Matts or SG Ball squad and playing firsts, you would think talent is not an issue here - some of these comments are probably the reason why we lose good players to league.

Perhaps the fellas making harsh comments on this blog about a bunch of teenagers hiding behind a blog could find something else to do.

I'm a Knox parent and just enjoy watching the boys playing footy on a sunny Saturday arvo - my days of playing are over and don't see the need to live the life of a footy player through the eyes of my son.

Let the boys (and coaches) play footy and provide some encouragement as there a lot of talented boys running around CAS this year.
 

noregrets

Chris McKivat (8)
The coach has copped a lot of flack on here – and some of it with good reason

Check the bottleneck the coach has created in the last 2years as the 2nd XV coach.
His record is ordinary. Other talented kids did not want to play for him and his co coach.
To highlight the difficulties the team has had to achieve, the last 2 years team has been exceptionally strong.the double V is what the boys play for, not the coaches.
what bottleneck? When he was coaching, won't they runner's up twice?
 

noregrets

Chris McKivat (8)
Are there any reports from any of the games? I didn't get to any of the games. I have seen the results, but no reports.
 

KickKicker10

Frank Row (1)
16 A's Knox vs Cranbrook.

The game was fairly even in possession throughout the whole game. Knox put it through the hands early and scored under the posts although it was lacklustre defence and poor communication between the Cranbrook 13. Ross & 15. Maples. Knox went in again, out wide but what to have looked like the man who had scored already was held on the ground and then got back up and crawled over. No.7 for Cranbrook was yellow carded late in the first half for what to maybe have been seen eyeing as punching. Big runs from (K) 5. Margin, 8. Horseley & 3. Upton, gave Knox great attacking field position. The referee would severely penalise both sides fro backchat and that proved costly for the two sides.

Half Time 12 Knox vs Cranbrook 0

The second half started with motivated attack from Cranbrook out on the wings and a couple big runs from (C) 8. Spira. Solid defence in the middle through (K)12. Tilley able to shut down big Cranbrook runners. Knox gave away many penalties that allowed Cranbrook to have great field position, often in the Knox 22. Knox's goal line defence was superb, holding up Cranbrook forwards, 7. Kemeny, 5. Matters, many times. Cranbrook went over with 6 minutes to go from 12. Busteed and 10. Winton converted to make it 12-7. For the last 5 minutes Cranbrook were penalised controversially at least 5 times. Although, Kemeny looked to have scored to even the match up, but the ref called it held up. More penalties gave Knox good field position and this allowed them to have most of the possession towards the final whistle.

Full time Knox 12 vs Cranbrook 7

Standouts

Knox:
12. Tilley
5. Margin
2. Purcell
15. Grattan (but thought there was a change there?, being 13. Hunter moved to Fullback)

Cranbrook
5. Matters
12. Busteed
14. Gibson
 

Mactruck

Bob McCowan (2)
Cranbrook was exposed against Knox yesterday. Intresting coaching decision to pull both (10) and (6) not long into the second half. Showed the coach had given up on winning and was resting his players for next week.

Lot of flack has been given regarding Knox's crowds but i'm interested if anybody has any choice words this time?
 

Snort

Nev Cottrell (35)
I've submitted this for the blog, but fully expect it to be censored! So here goes:

Match report Trinity v Barker

So, I'm curious. Just for the purposes of research, has anyone else been up for an early morning match at Knox's Gillespie Field? And if so, did you succumb to the temptation of one of their egg and bacon sandwiches? And if so, did it poison you?

I'm asking because I was crippled yesterday by a massive bout of food poisoning, and the egg and bacon sandwich was undoubtedly the culprit as it was the only thing I ate all day. It's odd, though, how much actually leaves your stomach compared to how much goes in, when you get a dose of whatever it was I got yesterday.

I feel mean writing this, because the kindly North Shore folk at Knox who cooked and sold the offending sandwich were friendly, good natured volunteers. I'm sure they weren't trying to poison me. Well, almost sure. If Graham Henry were coaching Cranbrook (and with Matt Williams at Knox, how far away can that be?), I can imagine his summary of yesterday's 1st XV game "Look, I'm not saying there was a conspiracy, but I've looked at the tape several times, and questions have to be asked about the pre-match sandwiches."

Anyway. I was feeling pretty seedy by the time I got to Summer Hill but perked up when I saw from the programme that Rihann Barkley-Brown was due to play 15 for the home side. Whether Trinity's pocket-sized excitement machine actually made it on to the field, I can't say, because as the teams ran out, I was busy making the first of many calls to Ruth on the big white telephone. By the time I looked out across the field through watery eyes, Trinity's 20 Benjamin Hyslop was on. Whatever happened, I guess Barkley-Brown's hamstring let him down again. Barker's star No9, Stephen Kirkby, was also out.

In case the information is ever useful to you, there is a bathroom at Trinity with a window through which the scoreboard may be glimpsed from certain angles, so I can tell you that at half-time the score was 10-5 to Barker. A try to Trinity 2 Anthony Nguyen was cancelled out by Barker's 13 Sean Campbell, and 15 David Balcomb converted and added a penalty to give the visitors a narrow lead. I gave up steering the porcelain bus for a while and made it down to the sideline in time to see Barker 12 Smerdon (playing out of his usual position to give Bruce Thompson a game at 10) bring the first half to an end with a smearing cover tackle.

Trinity came out of the blocks hard in the second half. Defending inside its quarter, Barker conceded a penalty for joining from the side, and 11 Fish reduced the margin to two points. A few moments later, blockbusting Trinity 13 Nathaniel Saofia made a bullocking charge towards the corner, and when the ball was recycled, 5 Liam Rasch made a break out wide and fed 12 Jordan Morris for the try. Justin Fish converted, and Trinity had regained the lead at 15-10. In trying to tackle Nathaniel Saofia, star Barker forward 6 Nic Burkett was injured, and he left the field, whereupon the trainer strapped his mid-section in what looked like Glad Wrap, which is a new one to me. Trinity attacked again and 10 Robert Siteine jinked through the line to feed a short pass to Saofia, who is close to unstoppable at short range. Fish's conversion made it 22-10.

Trinity had all the momentum, but that changed in 90 seconds of madness. As Barker attacked in the Trinity quarter, Saofia was yellow-carded for a dangerous, no-arms tackle. The call looked borderline to me. It seemed to me as though Nathaniel Saofia was raising his arms to tackle Campbell, but was surprised at the speed with which the Barker player entered the collision, and so hit him chest-first before he could wrap his arms around his target. It wasn't a terrible call, just a line-ball one. Less than a minute later, as Barker attacked a few metres out, 6 Pernell Filipo reached through the ruck to knock the ball out of the hands of Barker 9 Hunter. And Filipo joined Saofia in the bin. It was poor discipline, but not every referee would have seen it as a card. So two line-ball decisions within two minutes had the result that Barker's fifteen played Trinity's thirteen for nearly ten minutes.

Barker didn't waste the advantage. The ball went wide from a scrum for Sean Campbell to score, and soon afterwards 8 Hamish Phipps went over from short range to make the score 22-22.

Trinity came back once it had its full complement on the field. Barker conceded a couple of penalties at the ruck in its own quarter (but no cards) and Justin Fish added a nerveless penalty to put Trinity 25-22 up. But Barker came back to have the final say when 5 Oscar Cole charged at the line and drove over to score the decisive try.

The players

For Barker, I wasn't convinced about the idea of David Smerdon playing 12; he threw a couple of loose passes and didn't control the game as he might have done at 10. 13 Sean Campbell was always a handful for the defence, running hard and straight. 7 Tim Pearson had a terrific game, foraging everywhere, before he went off injured. Trinity's best was 5 Liam Rasch, perhaps the best line-out forward in the competition, and a great contributor around the field. 1 Harry McLennan was strong and relative newcomer 12 Jordan Morris had his best game at this level so far.

The wrap up

It was a scappy game that rose to no great heights, but two under-strength teams, weakened by injury, threw everything at each other, and the close score and willing nature of the play kept things interesting. The teams kept going until they had nothing left to give. After the way I spent the first half, I knew how they felt.

The scorers

Barker 27 S Campbell 2 H Phipps O Cole tries D Balcomb 2 goals, penalty goal

Trinity 25 A Nguyen, N Saofia, J Morris tries J Fish 2 goals 2 penalty goals
 

Kilgore Trout

Herbert Moran (7)
I doubt it, better team in ONE game perhaps but they were not in the previous clash and not the best team against Waverley. Seems to me Cranbrook might just know that this game was not as important as others in terms of the CAS premiership.
Score like that at Knoxs is never a true indication

Apparently scores at Knox are never a true indication unlike scores at Cranbrook and anyway Cranbrook werent trying their hardest
 

Snort

Nev Cottrell (35)
Knox's losses have added up to 5 points (3 v cranbrook, 2 v waverly) and they were unlucky to lose both games, cranbrook lost to knox today by 36 points

While knox may have been inconsistent (and unlucky) throughout the season, I believe today they showed they were the best team in the comp

I picked Knox as likely winners at the start of the season, and I think they were probably the side with the most potential. And, yes, that had a very strong win over Cranbrook and their for-and-against is massive. So, they're a very good side.

But a ten-round competition is all about endurance and consistency. Knox lost two of its first six games. Cranbrook won its first eight straight. There's no doubt that Knox has quality players and can run up big scores. But nor is there any doubt that, so far, Cranbrook has been the most consistent side.

It could yet come unstuck for Cranbrook. St Aloysius seems to have found some form, and won't lie down in the last game. I understand that a few years back the CAS decided that where teams finish equal on points, the points differential decides the premiership, so Cranbrook needs to win to clinch the title. If they hold on, it would be graceless to suggest that they don't deserve it.

By the way, I think the 10 round competition was introduced in 2009 and I'm pretty sure this is the first time it has gone down to the final round. So that's good.
 

Lee Grant

John Eales (66)
Staff member
Guys - please no more discussion about coaches being liked or not liked and yarda yarda.

People who write these things take it for fact and they will jump up and say it is a fact, but let's be careful about libeling people.

If there is any doubt about some such opinion being posted, the moderators will nuke your post.

Even if it is right. We don't care if you're right.

Even discussion about the matter will be nuked. No, it's not a democracy. Go elsewhere for that.
.
 

Mactruck

Bob McCowan (2)
Apparently scores at Knox are never a true indication unlike scores at Cranbrook and anyway Cranbrook werent trying their hardest


Take a look at the margin knox lost by in their two losses. 2 or 3 points to cranbrook? At Cranbrook? Then look at the margin cranbrook lost by. Cranbrook must be feeling incredibly red faced after what was simply a clinic, although they have the better record they are not the better team.
 
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