Reds 2015

[Train Without a Station]

We shouldn't need a clean out. The previous clean out, only 4 years ago mind you, should have identified the key warning signs for the current and future regimes. It's most of the same people from the last rebuild still there!

 

[Jets]

Sam Greene = Bench 2015!

His kicking and positional play is outstanding. His defence would obviously need work.

But he is more than up to it.

How old is Greene? Is he eligible for Asut U20's next year?

I would be surprised if they picked him over McIntyre. I am guessing that the finals series of Premier Rugby will be interesting in regards to how the 10's from each club perform.

 

[Scoey]

AAAAAGH,

We will be the Tahs.
Cheika's first year average, second year the Tahs are in the finals and favourites to win the title.

RG's first year fairly poor but look out for the second year - Reds to win Super 15 title.

This, my friends, is my positivity post of the year.

It may well be your positivity post of the year Scrubber me ol' mate but it's the saddest indictment of our affairs that I've ever seen that we may become the Tahs and that would be a good thing!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Scrubber2050]

Scoey - only want the result mate.

I am trying to remain in my positive frame of mind. I have thrown a few rocks over the fence in respect of performances etc and, had them chucked back at me by some posters (who are obviously oblivious to reality of professional sport).

Reds to win in 2015

 

[Jets]

Good work Scrubber. We all know if you support a team you have to agree with everything they do and never question everything. That's why these forums are here.

 

[Braveheart81]

Oblivious to the realities of professional sport?

Says the guy who wanted to fire James Horwill and replace him with ???

 

[Scrubber2050]

Good work Scrubber. We all know if you support a team you have to agree with everything they do and never question everything. That's why these forums are here.

Love it
RG for Premier and the rest of the squad can make up the Ministery

We will win !!!!!!

 

[Scrubber2050]

Oblivious to the realities of professional sport?

Says the guy who wanted to fire James Horwill and replace him with ???

Braveheart 81.
Do you agree or disagree with the following:

professional teams need to evolve at some point in time. YES?NO
Is evolution based on performance YES/NO
Can performance of a player be related to chronic injury, age, off field dramas, loss of mojo, loss of motivation etc YES/NO

 

[Scoey]

Scoey - only want the result mate.

I am trying to remain in my positive frame of mind. I have thrown a few rocks over the fence in respect of performances etc and, had them chucked back at me by some posters (who are obviously oblivious to reality of professional sport).

Reds to win in 2015

Yeah what Jets said. Just to clarify, I wasn't knocking your post Scrubber.

 

[Braveheart81]

Braveheart 81.
Do you agree or disagree with the following:

professional teams need to evolve at some point in time. YES?NO
Is evolution based on performance YES/NO
Can performance of a player be related to chronic injury, age, off field dramas, loss of mojo, loss of motivation etc YES/NO

I agree with all those things to some degree.

The point remains though that Horwill was one of the Reds better players through the season and his form improved as the season went on. I'd argue he finished the season in the best form he's had since 2011.

Obviously he's one of your highest paid players but that is essentially irrelevant at this stage. Is there a better player that could be signed instead? Seems unlikely.

Remuneration in no way dictates how well a player can or will play. It's not like getting rid of Horwill and paying younger people more will make them play better.

 

[Train Without a Station]

Scrubber was just letting his passion getting the best of him. Ironically Horwill would probably understand!

 

[Ash]

Obviously he's one of your highest paid players but that is essentially irrelevant at this stage. Is there a better player that could be signed instead? Seems unlikely.

Remuneration in no way dictates how well a player can or will play. It's not like getting rid of Horwill and paying younger people more will make them play better.

Rumour has it that the bolded statement isn't even true, so I fail to see Scrubber's agenda against him.

There's plenty of bigger issues at the Reds than the complete non-issue that is Big Kev.

 

[Parse]

Braveheart 81.
Do you agree or disagree with the following:

professional teams need to evolve at some point in time. YES?NO
Is evolution based on performance YES/NO
Can performance of a player be related to chronic injury, age, off field dramas, loss of mojo, loss of motivation etc YES/NO

Puts hand up - I want to answer this.

professional teams need to evolve at some point in time. NO
professional teams are constantly evolving and should never take the attitude "at some point we should evolve". it has to be an ongoing process.

Is evolution based on performance NO
evolution is the ongoing makeup of a team including all internal and external forces throughout the team. Evolution will occur regardless of how the team performs.

Can performance of a player be related to chronic injury, age, off field dramas, loss of mojo, loss of motivation etc NO
Player performance has to be attributed to all aspects of the players professional and personal life and all of this needs to be managed correctly by the coach and his staff to provide a successful outcome for the player and the team. This is why failures team wide are generally blamed to the coaching staff. An injured player can still be a positive influence to the team's performance, while not being able to perform on the field themselves, their motivational, communication and team spirit can still assist in improving the team wide performance.

 

[Train Without a Station]

Scrubber the point Braveheart is making is those 3 questions are irrelevant due to, who would you replace James Horwill with?

The talk of evolution is redundant if there's no idea of what the team is evolving too.

 

[Scrubber2050]

Guys, all I want is Horwill to be back tyo his best - not fucking improving as the year went on. Fuck the bloke was Wallaby captain is Reds Captain and sure he had a horrific injury but whether you agree or not HIS overall performances this year were not to his high standard.

Compare the performances of Mowen/Moore at the Brums, Dennis/Hooper at the Tahs, Higgers at Rebels, Hodgson at the Force. Thery are all dominant players, probably in the best form of their careers.

If performance is not the one criteria to be gauged the we will have a team of loyal 40 or 50 year olds. Tap yourself or be Tapped - very difficult for any player

 

[Train Without a Station]

Mate I think you've got a skewed view of reality. I doubt anybody would consider Mowen, Dennis or Higgers to be dominant this year.

The bloke has had a number of injuries. It's unrealistic to expect him to just magically be at his best. Are you an active person? Do you actually realise how much an injury affects you when you are at a high level of fitness like James would have been at his best? Can you really understand how much 3 major lower body injuries over the course of 4 seasons would really affect the bloke? Consider the fact that last year he played, got injured, as soon as he was fit he was back in the team, then on tour, constantly picking up niggles and not healing further, whilst playing on the EOYT. In addition, he didn't have the opportunity to bring his fitness base back up. Modern sport does not allow for that, he would have been just trying to keep up.

Then he gets 1 month break finally and he's back into it again and playing within a few weeks. He's done fucking amazingly well to be back improving as the year went on.

You're getting completely carried away. Nobody is saying keep blokes that are past it when there are better options. People are saying keep one who has been the heart and soul of the team, who has been injury affected and has scope to improve further from where he is, and is still in his peak age as a player because there simply isn't somebody better than he currently is to replace him.

You are not holding him to the standard of needing to be better than his replacement, you are holding him to where you perceive he would be.

Let me ask you this. What benefit do the Reds get if we get rid of James because he's not playing as good as we think he can or has, to replace him with a player who is playing at their absolute best if they are not playing better than James currently is anyway?

 

[Train Without a Station]

The Reds scrum has been quite good by the way, and James has actually been dominant in the line out. I think he has taken more steals than Simmons in fact. So he's been pretty dominant at one third of his job and clearly above-average at another.

http://www.greenandgoldrugby.com/wallabies-selections-locking-in-some-discipline/

Also at the halfway point of the season as shown above James was third for runs of the lock candidates and third for tackle busts. That was pretty much equal with his All Black equivalent Brodie Retallick. He was also equal second for tackles made, and well ahead of Brodie.

Now that doesn't tell the full picture, but what it does tell me is he's doing well amongst the top locks for quality (tackle busts) amongst the stats and his work rate is definitely high.

Unless you're waiting for the bloke to turn fucking water into wine he's going ok. And keep in mind that was the first half of the season. He picked up his performances from the Blues game onward.

 

[Braveheart81]

If Horwill remains injury free for the rest of the year and then still takes half of next season to get into good form then I'd be a bit worried.

If he gets through the rest of this year and can have a good offseason you'd expect him to be right at his peak next year.

 

[Train Without a Station]

Exactly. I think Link did James a disservice taking him on the EOYT with the intention of replacing him. He ended up playing, but was really just filling in for the Wallabies at the time. Would have benefited greatly from a full off-season and pre-season based on his condition.

 

[Scoey]

The Reds scrum has been quite good by the way, and James has actually been dominant in the line out. I think he has taken more steals than Simmons in fact. So he's been pretty dominant at one third of his job and clearly above-average at another.

Also at the halfway point of the season as shown above James was third for runs of the lock candidates and third for tackle busts. That was pretty much equal with his All Black equivalent Brodie Retallick. He was also equal second for tackles made, and well ahead of Brodie.

Now that doesn't tell the full picture, but what it does tell me is he's doing well amongst the top locks for quality (tackle busts) amongst the stats and his work rate is definitely high.

Unless you're waiting for the bloke to turn fucking water into wine he's going ok. And keep in mind that was the first half of the season. He picked up his performances from the Blues game onward.

As a(n ex) lock and a guy that is quite open about his man-crush on Kev, this post was very enjoyable to read. Very.