Allow me an attempt to explain.MARB wrote:That performance tonight was nowhere near acceptable. I've been angry watching Rugby matches before but this just takes the biscuit. I can tolerate a bad referring performance, or cruel luck and a battling performance (Sarries, Leinster et al,) but by Christ I can not tolerate the load of continuous pish handed out to us loyal fans week after week after week. Yes we've been winning and for the life me of me I can't figure out why because we have been nothing short of atrocious this season. Think back to MA's first season in charge- hammered the Dragons at Rodney Parade and played some superb Rugby that night if my memory severs me correctly. I am in no way praising the Cowboy but things were certainly a lot easier and the blood pressure a lot more healthy when we were sitting pretty at the top of the league, qualifying for the HEC 1/4's as the top team in Europe etc.
Bar Glasgow and Leicester this season has been complete and utter tripe served up on a weekly basis, and I'm fed up of journo's and TV pundits not delivering the harsh reality of the situation because they're 'friends' with the players or represent them. To have the same tom kite game plan executed poorly week after week after week is disgraceful. And for Doak to insult the fans by coming out with tripe like last week in his interview post-Scarlets just rubs me up the wrong way.
Something needs to change, our performances don't merit our league position and I would gladly see the back of Doak, Clarke and Bell in a heartbeat.
Some of the players in this team need to take a long hard look at themselves, they only have to look and see the players who have worn this jersey: Kyle, Gibson, WJ McBride, Ferris, Muller, Humph, Pienaar, and realise there are people out there who dream of wearing this shirt and thanks to a home final possibly we have a real chance of delivering silverware and quite frankly most of this current crop just don't look interested.
Fecking Welsh.
Even with the dross this season, we are in a league where a team like Ulster have more than 50% of games that should not be lost - though we have lost 2 of them this year - that is beyond question.
Furthermore we have some remarkable individual players who even during a dire performance will come up with moments of inspired play, often enough to win a game. Think of a completely dire performance against Scarlets, 45 minutes of utter dross, then Gilroy scores an utterly individual magical try, it was enough to inspire 10 or 15 minutes to win the game, but not enough to press on with 20 minutes to go to take a TBP.
Win the game, yet fall short of what they should have done. That has been what most games have been like, not uniformly dire, just generally stuttering performances with just enough to get by in most.
Make no mistake, we have the players to win this league, we should have done it in 2013, we might still have a go at it this year but its very hard to imagine that the players can suddenly string together 7 decent performances against goodish teams.
So part of it is that the league is poor this year, part is that we have good players, much of it is that we are making a mess of getting these good players to perform as a team in any remotely consistent way, is a conundrum within a paradox that frustrates the greatest minds.................. & our coaching staff obviously.
In short it's a feckin' miracle we are contending, given how much appears to be wrong, sadly I will be astonished if we make the final.