Brumbies v Reds SR round 14

Yes he does have a yellow card and twice he thought about it. In that first 30 minutes if he had used it evenly it would have been a 11 aside match with no captains in the first 10mins, the heightened state of the players wouldn't have changed too much adrenalin flowing, there was a lot to lose and not in the moment only.

Funnily enough, a yellow has always come across as having a calming effect on the adrenalin infused players you speak of.

With 11 long arms in 25 minutes, it's ridiculous there wasn't a yellow card.

If you don't defend and define the boundaries, they will be perpetually tested. Professional players are very good at this.

Unfortunately I don't believe anything was going to calm down the crew last night some of the stuff that was occurring was so out of character in both teams that I think the adrenalin had masked any reasoning and time fixed it. Time to work the adrenalin out of their systems.

of·fi·cious/əˈfiSHəs/


Adjective:

1. Assertive of authority in an annoyingly domineering way, esp. with regard to petty or trivial matters.
2. Intrusively enthusiastic in offering help or advice; interfering.

Synonyms: meddlesome - obtrusive - intrusive

^umm you're welcome

Probably 7 of those 11 penalties were against the attacking team. Refs don't often give yellows against attacking players.

Link will say that the balance of penalties was wrong. Should be able 2/3 against defensive team. Walsh evened it up in the second half, but I doubt it would have been much over 50/50 in the end.

Get the balance wrong and you cause exactly what we saw - teams scared to play with the ball in hand.

That's true, but something needs to give - the rucks were an absolute mess, attacking or defensively and it made for a poor match.

If you infringe, you should get pinged. Get pinged repeatedly, go and have 10 to think about it and so on. Easy.

I didn't have sports ears at the game, so didn't know 100% of the time why the penalties were given - but no distinction should be made if its sealing the ruck, diving over, not releasing etc versus tackler not releasing, not rolling away etc. A penalty is a penalty in my book, and strangely enough, in the IRB's too.

Perhaps we could bring back rucking, and I'd assume the rucks would be a lot cleaner (per se) and involve a lot less individuals laying about or infringing.

There weren't many penalties that were the same and if they were, they weren't by the same player to constitute giving a yellow.

For both teams the penalties were for illegal scrum engagements, sealing off and holding onto the ball at ruck time when attacking.

For the last penalty, in the lead up you could see Walsh step back in the previous phases and say 'I'm leaving this to you guys to sort out' but couldn't let it go any long when S Faingaa came around the side and could have been pinged earlier.

Haven't see those long passes this season yet, no.

I saw one last night. Unfortunatley it went 5 yards forward.

The Quade Activity Ratio of excellent:faulty:stupid is not looking terrific after 1.5 games.

Looking for improvement in the next games.

Have you trademarked that, RH? A very useful indicator I think

Noy quite sure how you think Highlanders main compettition for Reds to make finals, Canes on same points, and Sharks are ahead of Reds .

Surely Link gets 8+/10 for his latest post-game pressers: honest, no BS, clear language, open about tactics needed and used, no hype, etc.:

http://www.foxsports.com.au/Rugby/0...367983798?subcat=1111112039622&site=FoxSports

Close was the high quality of White and Mowen (how the actual or potential leadership talent of the latter was ignored by the Tahs is inexplicable, just listening via this link to Mowen, this guy's got it and can explain it too):

http://www.foxsports.com.au/rugby/0...-e6frf4pu-1226367984987?sectionvertical=rugby

Jnor, applied for, but discovered already registered to NZ Rugby.

Look at the applied leadership vacuum in the Tahs game last night with Barnes screaming for the ball and failing to get it and him yelling in frustration and he saw the result slip away. The Tahs traded a true Captain for an anointed one that plays two games and a group that couldn't build the proverbial camel.

I meant the highlanders and sharks are the main competitors.

I'm pretty happy with how Quades going, to be honest, considering he has had no rugby beyond the 40 minutes v the Lions last week for 6 months.

Interesting that QC didn't get cramps at the end, like his opposite number (it's called experience)