I like to watch
David Codey (61)
You can’t have both longbottom & coward on together, you can hide one, not two from being cleaned out.
Olympic 7's
- Thread starter waiopehu oldboy
- Start date
I like to watch
David Codey (61)
if we have a brand atm, it’s the possession team.
he just wants to recycle and keep the ball away from the other team.
im not sure how Coward fits into that philosophy.
coach seems a nice guy, but, to my eye, he got a flyer on the rest of the other nations women’s teams,by having rugby ready players with great touch experience.
year by year, under his control,they deteriorated.
he’s had his chances.
Dan54
David Wilson (68)
I think the idea of filling the team with Kerevi's etc is not going to work. Kerevi was good because he played in 2 minute spells seemingly, so really wasn't tested big time on defence etc. I get the idea you have to have a whole diffierent mindset to play the game, and maybe you can get away with quick entrances into game so rest of team mates don't have to work too long helping you in defence etc. That is in no way saying Kerevi couldn't learn it, just I think you have to play a fair bit to be comfortable with it. These boys are only getting a pretty basic wage,(mate's son who was in team a few years back says the most money was made by cashing in air points) so probably you not going to get too many top players from 15s.
waiopehu oldboy
George Smith (75)
5th place SF1 Canada v USA, SF2 Aus v SA - 11:30 AEST
Medal SF1 NZ v GB - 13:00 our time, SF2 Fiji v Arg
Medal SF1 NZ v GB - 13:00 our time, SF2 Fiji v Arg
wamberal
Phil Kearns (64)
Unworkable. How much conditioning would they need for Sevens?
PhilClinton
Mark Loane (55)
To everyone saying ‘you’ve gotta be 7s specialist, it won’t work if you bring outsiders in’ - what do you propose? More of the same crap that’s been coming out of the 7s program?
Ignore the details of where the players come from, Australia as a nation has enough brilliant footy players that they should be able to field a seriously strong team for marquee events like the Olympics. Yes pulling together 10 blokes from different codes to train for a few weeks probably isn’t the answer, but if you identify the top talent nation wide over a period of time and put them in camps during off-season etc, it would work.
Not many guys playing NRL, Super Rugby, hell even AFL get a chance to win a gold medal, I’m sure heaps would love the opportunity to be involved.
Kerevi trained with the 7s team for two weeks, he’s a natural footy player and it showed. Remove the 7s purist bias from your heads and you’ll see that some blokes can just play good open space running footy and if we can get them together once every 4 years it’ll become our event to lose.
Ignore the details of where the players come from, Australia as a nation has enough brilliant footy players that they should be able to field a seriously strong team for marquee events like the Olympics. Yes pulling together 10 blokes from different codes to train for a few weeks probably isn’t the answer, but if you identify the top talent nation wide over a period of time and put them in camps during off-season etc, it would work.
Not many guys playing NRL, Super Rugby, hell even AFL get a chance to win a gold medal, I’m sure heaps would love the opportunity to be involved.
Kerevi trained with the 7s team for two weeks, he’s a natural footy player and it showed. Remove the 7s purist bias from your heads and you’ll see that some blokes can just play good open space running footy and if we can get them together once every 4 years it’ll become our event to lose.
RebelYell
Arch Winning (36)
If we looked at it from just a Rugby perspective, and assumed all Aussie based players would be available, something like this for a 12 player squad wouldn't be bad:
1. Malouf
2. Holland
3. Longbottom
4. McDermott
5. Kerevi
6. Uru
7. Petaia
8. T.Wright
9. Daugunu
10. Samu
11. Banks
12. Hooper
1. Malouf
2. Holland
3. Longbottom
4. McDermott
5. Kerevi
6. Uru
7. Petaia
8. T.Wright
9. Daugunu
10. Samu
11. Banks
12. Hooper
Pfitzy
Nathan Sharpe (72)
And in the meantime have zero attack value from the big boppers.
Die fast or die slow.
Squad needs a good clean out IMO. The old stalwarts of Malouf, Holland, Hutchinson and Anderson are no longer up for it. The only ones who should be guaranteed a spot for next year are Longbottom, Miller and perhaps Roache who I liked the look of. Two very underwhelming Olympics campaigns in a row, time to change it up.
Adam84
Rod McCall (65)
Sometimes there isn’t a clear and obvious solution to the problem.
Australia isn’t the only country with terrific athletes in other codes and in XVs who could have backfilled the Olympic squad to make those teams better, so i don't think this is a uniquely Australian problem.
Ultimately 7’s just doesn’t have the same money on offer, and whilst i think winning a gold medal would appeal to individuals it doesn’t seem to appeal to those clubs and teams who manage the purse strings, not just in Australia but globally. And the NRL/AFL aren’t about to help out a competing code at the expense of their own product by freeing up their players.
Kerevi is an exception to the norm, but even he lacked the conditioning to be maintained on the pitch for whole games. Yes bring in a few players, but i disagree with the notion that the whole team could be replaced with those unfamiliar with 7s.
likely to only be half a dozen on contracts.
Speaking of contracts, it seems Manenti has signed a 3 year renewal. I would have thought perhaps wait until after the Games to do that?
Dctarget
Tim Horan (67)
You have to navigate through the other live channels TOK23 is for rugby.
eastman
John Solomon (38)
It's a good point- there are more than enough talented 'footballers' and athletes in Australia that we should be consistently in the top echelon of sevens and above the likes of USA and Argentina.
I don't think we need to go to the extent of recruiting AFL or even NRL quality players (and realistically we can't), but there is huge accessible talent in the reserve rugby league comps that hasn't been locked away by NRL club. Some of our best players recently have been inspired recruits from these pools such as Longbottom and Shannon Walker.
We do need to move away from the consistent pale/ stale selections we have seen over the last decade.
Also I don't mind using it as a bit of a breading ground of young talent. The likes of Harry Wilson, Isaac Lucas, Will Harrison, Marky Mark (Nawaqanitawase) etc. Give them a year or two apprenticeship under Walsh (or whomever) to really refine their skills (as the likes of Holland, Anstee, O'Donnell, Porch, Anderson etc have shown to various degrees this year). Let them travel the world for a couple of years until they are 21 or so and then unleash them on Super Rugby.
PhilClinton
Mark Loane (55)
It's a great idea Reg, the problem currently of course is Harry Wilson gets paid $200k to play Super Rugby for the Reds when he leaves school.
If he chose the 7s pathway he'd have $50 tuckshop money and a free pair of boots.
The entire 7s program needs an overhaul, maybe using it as a Super Rugby feeder is the answer.
All of this is dependent on COVID getting resolved and the World Series getting back up and running. Until that happens 7s is going to offer very little incentive to be involved. The biggest issue with 7s is that currently it is a choice between becoming a XVs player or a 7s player.
If you look at NZs 7s program they tend to have the experienced players who make a career out of it but then front up for some XVs rugby in the Mitre 10 Cup at the end of the season. They then have some young guys who do it for a couple of years before embarking on a XVs career.
We need to go back to that situation where young guys like Bernard Foley, Sean McMahon, Nick Phipps etc. played some 7s before becoming fulltime XVs players. It needs to be a good part of their development rather than something that will derail their XVs career.
We then need the career guys who like the lifestyle and get remunerated enough. We need something like the NRC back so they can be playing that though so we can always keep a grounding in being a "proper" rugby player and ensure they are of decent standard.
At the moment it really seems like 7s is an option for a bunch of guys who can't really make it elsewhere. Obviously there are guys in our squad where that isn't the case but there are too many players that just aren't up to it at the top level.
If you look at NZs 7s program they tend to have the experienced players who make a career out of it but then front up for some XVs rugby in the Mitre 10 Cup at the end of the season. They then have some young guys who do it for a couple of years before embarking on a XVs career.
We need to go back to that situation where young guys like Bernard Foley, Sean McMahon, Nick Phipps etc. played some 7s before becoming fulltime XVs players. It needs to be a good part of their development rather than something that will derail their XVs career.
We then need the career guys who like the lifestyle and get remunerated enough. We need something like the NRC back so they can be playing that though so we can always keep a grounding in being a "proper" rugby player and ensure they are of decent standard.
At the moment it really seems like 7s is an option for a bunch of guys who can't really make it elsewhere. Obviously there are guys in our squad where that isn't the case but there are too many players that just aren't up to it at the top level.
eastman
John Solomon (38)
Historically (and recently) this is exactly what it has been; Phipps, Bernard Foley, Sean McMahon, Cameron Clark and others all got their starts in the system.