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This week, with Pocock at 7 for the Force I would play Jenkins with Alcock on the bench. We need someone who is on the ball protecting possession from the world's new master poacher.

The operative word is could. I think the Force "could" win a game this year though right now that would have to be a long shot. I agree with the sentiment though. Right now, on form displayed so far, only the Waratahs would be competitive against the four best Kiwi sides. The jury is out on...

Round three was the first round where we got a look at some inter-conference match ups and it wasn't pretty. So far you'd have to say: Reds: Very lucky to be 3 from 3. Had real trouble with the Force, who were smashed next week by the worst NZ franchise. Waratahs: 1 from 3 but appear to...

What we can say right now is that the NZ conference looks the strongest. The Highlanders, Chiefs and Crusaders have all been good and now the Blues have bounced back to knock over the Bulls at home, no easy task. Only the Hurricanes look off the pace and yet they are 2 of 3 and won decisively...

This is not a comp for the best 15, and you just replace anyone who gets injured. That's what we did last year and by the time we got to the finals we had a team full of 3rd and 4th choices. I even gave it a name - the Hickey syndrome, aka play till you're stuffed. The whole squad needs to be...

100% agree. I thought the reason the front row went up was that the Highlanders' front row fractured. Just a poor decision but it was Bryce Lawrence. My expectations are very low.

They only had the ball for a tiny proportion of the match. You can take that two ways: Either they are a great attacking team as yet unrecognised by the critics or their opponents did not know what to do with the ball when they had it. My money is on the latter. We (and a lot of our Saffer...

The one point difference was all about the breakdown. But I don't think we were just lucky to be in the game. We did some really good things too, though not always getting any reward. The Highlanders highly vaunted scrum was going backwards all night, they just managed to clear it before the...

Dropped out of Latin at the end of year 11. Rates as one of my ten all time best decisions. I didn't have a clue.

Crusaders, Highlanders and Chiefs would have murdered the Reds tonight. They'll need to make a huge improvement to win in SA.

You probably don't realise it being a Queenslander, but your post just set you up to prove the opposite.

Geez Cyclo, I had to go look it up! I would have gone with asinine myself. That scrum penalty was a direct result of the Tahs scrum getting dominance and causing the Clan front row to fragment. Wasn't too happy with some of his other decisions either - he allowed a very wide gate and missed a...

All we can hope for now is that Bryce does a hamstring in the warm-up and Vinny gets a gig. I don't think that Munro has had a referee's job this year - looks like they are sidelining him to allow for some "new" talent. Waste of a very good referee.

This is almost a must-win game for the Force. A loss here will destroy their confidence completely and have them bottom four this season. They won't get many easier home games either, the Hurricanes pack has got little to write home about - either inexperienced newbies or guys who are on the...

This season Daley has played 124 minutes for 11 tackles and 0 missed. Holmes has played 57 minutes for 16 tackles and 1 missed. (Source Fox) Don't care what Link said last year, Daley has not performed well so far.

Graham does not seem to watch the matches that the Force play. Mafi has been on fire, the two centres have been next to hopeless in both games and Nalaga has hardly seen the ball. Solution? Sack Mafi, rotate the centres who have been so poor and leave the rest of the backline as-is. He does...

The Force are not going to get too many better chances to post a win this year. The Canes will come last in the NZ franchise, they've just had two hard games in SA, will have to overcome W-E jetlag and are still playing away. Some of the Force injury problems look to be resolving and Mafi has...

I agree. It is really hurting us big-time that we don't have another good kicker in the team somewhere. The best thing Foley (B) can do right now and for the next few weeks is grab a mate to fetch the balls and head off to a suburban ground and practise kicking for a couple of hours a day.

If they lose this, they will have lost two out of three. To get the magic first or second spot you can only afford to lose three games. I very much doubt that they won't care enough. I am more worried that they don't yet have all the cattle assembled and ready, while the Highlanders look to...

The Tahs scrum seems to have adopted a different strategy this year. To my eyes they seem to be content to hold the scrum at the engage (probably to avoid being penalised by a random decision generator) and then put on a second shove. You don't get many tight heads that way you just disrupt...