Ulster v Dragons - Pro12 G13 - Fri 5th Feb 19:35

[scrum5]

Diack,Williams back. Ruan back from holiday, McCall on bench, still no Henry and Franco rested. Might well see Andrew start with J Murphy on the bench!!!

Virus surely?

Henry will be a few weeks yet. Franco is overdue his rest.

I think you've made a fair call. Sadly for us, Ulster have the two best IQ'd hookers in Ireland at the moment.

I am very fervently hoping that Schmidt has his blue/conservative/whatever glasses on when it comes to Herring. He absolutely deserves to be playing for Ireland, but I'm lacking the optimism today to see starting John Andrew as a good thing.

Why?
I like anything I've seen from Andrew. We bemoan strength in depth and then go weak kneed about playing a player who can now only improve if he gets game time.

It's the great frustration about working with young players. You have to have the fortitude to step back and watch them make mistakes and be inconsistent.

Face facts. In any fair world Herring is the second best Hooker in Ireland on current form.

NS at one of his last Meet the Players evenings, Johanne was asked who were the up and coming young players, his reply was that John Andrews was the one to watch.....that will do for me

[BuckRogers]

John Andrews is very small would be my only real concern about him. Yes he covers the ground very well etc but he reminds me a bit of 'Arry Thacker of Leicester Tigers. He needs two reliable props if you're going to throw him into the melting pot IMO.

Snipe stop lying to yourself, the inspector was a non entity yet again when he came on. He made two tackles and missed one. One of those tackles, the stats will tell you, was 'positive' in modern coaching parlance. That's the very least you expect of someone. He hit very few rucks mind.

I'd be tempted to look at something like-

1-Black, 2-Andrew, 3-Ross, 4-AOC, 5-Diack, 6-Wilson, 7-Reidy, 8-Williams, 9-Pienaar, 10-Olding, 11-Scholes, 12-Marshall, 13-Cave, 14-Gilroy, 15-Ludik

Murphy, Warwick, Simpson, Browne, Dow, Marshall, Humphreys, Stockdale

That team is more than capable of giving the Dregons a hiding.

[Snipe Watson]

John Andrews is very small would be my only real concern about him. Yes he covers the ground very well etc but he reminds me a bit of 'Arry Thacker of Leicester Tigers. He needs two reliable props if you're going to throw him into the melting pot IMO.

Snipe stop lying to yourself, the inspector was a non entity yet again when he came on. He made two tackles and missed one. One of those tackles, the stats will tell you, was 'positive' in modern coaching parlance. That's the very least you expect of someone. He hit very few rucks mind.

I'd be tempted to look at something like-

1-Black, 2-Andrew, 3-Ross, 4-AOC, 5-Diack, 6-Wilson, 7-Reidy, 8-Williams, 9-Pienaar, 10-Olding, 11-Scholes, 12-Marshall, 13-Cave, 14-Gilroy, 15-Ludik

Murphy, Warwick, Simpson, Browne, Dow, Marshall, Humphreys, Stockdale

That team is more than capable of giving the Dregons a hiding.

Get away up the yard. The fella did fine. He got about 15 minutes and did little wrong......

You bin readin espn stats page again? It'll stunt your growth.

[BuckRogers]

Ah come on now, some consistency please. Doing little wrong against a side as diabolically poor as Treviso is no yard stick.

You've been harping on about iHumph and how his cowardice has a negative impact on a team who become concerned at having to cover for him as well as their 'own job'. I can assure you the same applies here.


Browne is saft and it's not gone unnoticed that he likes carrying in wider channels but is not so fond of tackling, rucking and mauling.

I agree about Humph, sadly he's finished. He's always been a liability in defence but his ability for the sublime has sometimes outweighed the negatives. I think his contract is up anyway and the only way he should play for Ulster again is if we have no kicker. Sadly we would have won some of those early games had Humph been playing, notably Scarlets away.

[Snipe Watson]

Ah come on now, some consistency please. Doing little wrong against a side as diabolically poor as Treviso is no yard stick.

You've been harping on about iHumph and how his cowardice has a negative impact on a team who become concerned at having to cover for him as well as their 'own job'. I can assure you the same applies here.


Browne is saft and it's not gone unnoticed that he likes carrying in wider channels but is not so fond of tackling, rucking and mauling.

I agree about Humph, sadly he's finished. He's always been a liability in defence but his ability for the sublime has sometimes outweighed the negatives. I think his contract is up anyway and the only way he should play for Ulster again is if we have no kicker. Sadly we would have won some of those early games had Humph been playing, notably Scarlets away.

Didn't use the cowardice word.

[BuckRogers]

Whoops, so you didn't. You might as well have and I know that's what you, and others, were inferring.

I'll retract and use testicular fortitude if cowardice offends anyone.

[ruckover]

I agree about Humph, sadly he's finished. He's always been a liability in defence but his ability for the sublime has sometimes outweighed the negatives. I think his contract is up anyway and the only way he should play for Ulster again is if we have no kicker. Sadly we would have won some of those early games had Humph been playing, notably Scarlets away.

Hmmmm, disagree about the bold bit. All he would have provided was another person to hoof the ball in the air.

[BuckRogers]

We missed at least 4 kicks at goal against the Scarlets in the first half, decided no point even trying for goal so kicked for the lineout and only lost by 8/9 points in the end. The Scarlets had 3 or 4 men in the bin. The Scarlets infringed with almost complete impunity anywhere between their own half and the try line.

Even with humphs well known aversions to tackling he could have been sufficiently hidden to kick a few points.

We did miss him in those early away games despite Nelson's decent showings. I really don't think that is even debatable tbh.

[BR]

I've just managed to rewatch the Treviso game. Happy that the difference was not directly the personnel on the pitch, but the fact that in the first 40 we had the backs running off 1st phase ball (or kicking off 1st phase ball, more often than not), or passing relatively wide to an individual forward or pod to create the next phase. In the second half it was much more round-the-corner phase building creating the space for a flatter backline. This was even before ihumph was replaced and it was starting to pay dividends. Not defending some of his poor play, but this weeks 'game of two halves' was not directly down to Humphries imho.

[Snipe Watson]

I've just managed to rewatch the Treviso game. Happy that the difference was not directly the personnel on the pitch, but the fact that in the first 40 we had the backs running off 1st phase ball (or kicking off 1st phase ball, more often than not), or passing relatively wide to an individual forward or pod to create the next phase. In the second half it was much more round-the-corner phase building creating the space for a flatter backline. This was even before ihumph was replaced and it was starting to pay dividends. Not defending some of his poor play, but this weeks 'game of two halves' was not directly down to Humphries imho.

They were a lot more direct in the second half. Lots more working round the corner and tying in the defence and then hard direct hit ups. It was the basics of good simple rugby. I know it's a cliché but it's a cliché because it's true, you have to earn the right to go wide. The second half was largely based upon the forwards getting through the basics. People say that it all changed when Olding went to 10. It didn't, iirc, Humph had 10 points from kicks. 2 pens and 2 conversions. By my reckon gun that means he was on the pitch for 2 tries. It was clear to me that the message had been simple at half time. Do the basics and play our patterns off the forwards doing the basics.

I don't think anybody with any sense is saying that Olding to 10 changed the game. The game was fairly safe when that change was made. Olding wasn't brilliant at 10 and his kicking was ........worth about 6 dodgy, dodgy kickers. The game changed at half time. We got our act together and stopped playing into their hands with aimless hoofball.

[Dave]

Humph used to be a player who couldn't tackle. Now he is a player who simply won't. I think Stu could do a job for us at 10 and I don't see how previous injuries would prevent this.

[Nightsoil]

Not dismissing Andrew's talent with my words (at least, not intentionally). Merely reflecting I'd prefer to see him built a bit more from the bench (although if he's got it, he'd probably be fine, and that's me being overly conservative) and that Herring's been a goddamn rock for us this season. Andrew himself - to be honest, I can't say much either way, because he barely ever plays! Crucially for a hooker though, I haven't noticed him muck up, that's a better omen than that glorious midfield break. Happy that others have such confidence in him though and hope he gets to show why.

For what it's worth, I saw no missed tackles etc. I don't honestly think the hysteria about his tackling putting pressure on the team is right. To be honest, he looks like a player who needs a few armchair rides to get his read and timing right.

Missed one that led to a line break not far from the end of his time on the pitch - remember it as I could see the guy running at him and knew there was a miss coming. ESPN, your friend and mine ( ) gives him as missing three.

More to the point though, I'm not sure we've got any armchair rides to hand out, I'm not sure the pack is strong enough. If he's not going to hit the right standard without them, we're in trouble.

[shamalicious]

Andrew has captained the As and from what little I've seen from him, he shows promise. Herring won't go unnoticed by Joe Schmidt forever and we need to start giving Andrew a bit more game time for him to settle.

[Indiana]

OAK like you I have just watched the match again and you are quite right. Ihumph goes off at 60mins when Ulster have scored two tries. However if you were Kiss and going by the Treviso match alone you would be hard pushed to pick him again.
In defence he is sadly lacking in this game he simply appears to avoid tackles. In the 14th minute inside the Ulster 22, again in the 19th when a promising Treviso move fails with a forward pass and again off a Treviso scrum in the 27th minute. He makes a poor attempt at a tackle in front of his posts on 30 mins and the Treviso 13 just runs past him on 42. The worst has to be again against 13 on 54 mins. He does however make a perfectly good tackle about a minute later on 11.
His distribution was poor to average the pass to Olding on 44 way off and the loopy pass just outside his 22 on 55mins almost resulting in an interception.
His kicking from hand failed to find touch on a number of occasions including one from a penalty and one restart which did unfortunately find touch.
His place kicking however was spot on scoring 10 points in the 60 minutes he was on.
this team has failed to win a match in the last 25 games and are without a coach so you would expect better. If I were Kiss with such an embarrassment of riches in the centre I think he could afford to develop Olding as the back up 10 whilst supporting his place kicking with Ruan. I could not see the reason to pick ihumph as a starting 10 again this season.

[OneMore]

Does he avoid tackling more than Ruan does? Is his tackling any worse than Ruan's?

For my money, the answer is no to both. Ruan just happens to play the vast majority of his games in a position that bit closer to his forwards.