Reds v Bulls. R8 2016

[Scoey]

Date: Saturday 16 April 2016
Venue: Loftus Versfeld, Pretoria
Kick Off: 5:05 pm local (Sunday 17 April - 1:05am AEST)
Referee: Angus Gardner
Assistant Referees: AJ Jacobs and TBA
TMO: Johan Greeff

We all know how the Reds have been tracking and regardless of how we played the first half on Sat night, I don't think anyone really has high expectations for our South African Tour. Our hopes are probably a bit higher now though!

Beating the Bulls at Loftus is never easy. Ever. They are currently sitting 2nd in their conference, 3rd in their Group and 8th overall, so you could say they are travelling ok. The Reds haven't played any of the top teams (apart from that little win over the 2nd best team and defending champs on the weekend) but I think it's fair to say that the Bulls have had the easier draw.

Bulls results to date: (Result/venue/opposition/oppo log position/points diff for that match)
R1 - Loss away Stormers (2nd) -24
R2 - Win home Rebels (9th) +20
R3 - Bye
R4 - Draw home Sharks (10th) 0
R5 - Win away Sunwolves (18th) +3
R6 - Win home Cheetahs (15th) +5
R7 - Win away Kings (17th) +32

If we are a chance of a win on tour, this is it. It's a tall order but we've seen what the boys are capable of now when it clicks.

Go you REDS!

 

[oztimmay]

R2 - Win home Force (16th) +20

Don't you mean the Rebels?

 

[Scoey]

I did indeed! Thanks! Fixed.

 

[Scrubber2050]

Same team to start.

Only worry was Simmo with AC injury - been cleared to tour so a jab or 3 should have him OK.

Bulls always tough on home soil but Reds to continue to build, win by 9.

This could be Liam's last trip to Africa (as I unfortunately think he will be lost to Australian rugby) so he will play the house down..

 

[dru]

Bulls are also on a re-build year bringing in Morais, who had little CC experience. He brought plenty of youngsters from the Blue Bulls and has a remit to ball-in-hand rugby. The starting front row should be good, but hasnt always been, and the Red 16, 17 and 18 will chew up their counterparts.

Pretty sure Red LO will have better stats, but we better be good at sacking or the Bull maul will be punishing.

Both backs pretty inexperienced.

Red fitness at altitude will be interesting.

If Bulls play 10 man rugby they'll kill us, if they use the ball, like they are meant to, we have a chance. Interesting to see how Jake copes with kicking at altitude.

Not likely, but not out of the question. Go Reds!

 

[BaysideBird]

Bulls are also on a re-build year

Isn't a Bulls rebuild year when they buy the entire Lions and Cheetahs squads?

 

[dru]

Isn't a Bulls rebuild year when they buy the entire Lions and Cheetahs squads?

Are you intentionally being, um, non supportive?

Name the players from Lions and Cheetahs in this squad. (I can, want to compare notes?) You'll find a short list. Now try it again, this time looking for Blue Bulls, and u 21.

This sort of conversation is distorted on Gr&G. Africa is a weird and unusual place. When a franchise seriously does the right thing, top to bottom... Hell as a rugby lover, if you cant recognise these guys intentions, well I'm leading into swearing now.

On THIS topic, RSA franchises being slightly rational, YOU PICKED THE WRONG FRANCHISE.

These blokes, in 2016, they are OK.

 

[TOCC]

I read that Simmons is unlikely to start against the Bulls


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[PaarlBok]

for some reason my reply thing don't work.

Name the players from Lions and Cheetahs in this squad. (I can, want to compare notes?)

Players from Cheetahs Piet van Zyl, Lappies Labuschagne, Marcell van der Merwe, Adriaan Strauss, Trevor Nyakane. Jan Serfontein played Craven Week for the Cheetahs.

 

[PaarlBok]

Bulls by 50. No way the Reds will beat them in Loftus on the form they are at the moment.

 

[TOCC]

Bulls by 50. No way the Reds will beat them in Loftus on the form they are at the moment.

You mean form against the Sunwolves, Kings and Cheetahs?

Who collectively in the past 18 matches have only won 2 games?

 

[Scoey]

I'm as happy as everyone else to see the Bulls finally playing some Rugby but their position on the ladder has been helped significantly by their draw. 2 of their 3 away games were against the bottom 2 teams in the comp.

I'm not saying that the Reds are all of a sudden world beaters, or that we've had a tough draw but this could be closer than the ladder positions of the two teams suggest. Bulls should be firm favourites but a lot will come down to whether the Reds can replicate the first half form from last week.

What will play into the Bulls favour significantly will be the altitude. The Reds were well and truly gassed by about 60mins at sea level so building a decent first half lead will be critical to being competitive on the weekend.

Some more stats.....
The Bulls (19) are ahead of the Reds (10) in tries scored but trailing the Reds in defenders beaten and clean breaks (118 to 112 and 54 to 43 respectively).

The Bulls have more carries for less metres (Bulls 667 for 2468m; Reds 647 for 2478m) but have more offloads than the Reds (65 to 59) which means there's not a lot of difference here.

The Bulls (92.5%) have the better lineout (Reds 89.8%) but the Reds scrum (94%) is streets ahead of the Bulls (80%) who are second worst in the comp surprisingly.

I don't know how much it skews the stats but it's worth noting that the attacking stats for the Reds in the first two rounds were dismal and there has been a marked improvement from round 3 on.

 

[waiopehu oldboy]

Ref: Gardner
AR's: Jacobs & TBC
TMO: Greeff

 

[No4918]

I'm as happy as everyone else to see the Bulls finally playing some Rugby but their position on the ladder has been helped significantly by their draw. 2 of their 3 away games were against the bottom 2 teams in the comp.

I'm not saying that the Reds are all of a sudden world beaters, or that we've had a tough draw but this could be closer than the ladder positions of the two teams suggest. Bulls should be firm favourites but a lot will come down to whether the Reds can replicate the first half form from last week.

What will play into the Bulls favour significantly will be the altitude. The Reds were well and truly gassed by about 60mins at sea level so building a decent first half lead will be critical to being competitive on the weekend.

Some more stats...
The Bulls (19) are ahead of the Reds (10) in tries scored but trailing the Reds in defenders beaten and clean breaks (118 to 112 and 54 to 43 respectively).

The Bulls have more carries for less metres (Bulls 667 for 2468m; Reds 647 for 2478m) but have more offloads than the Reds (65 to 59) which means there's not a lot of difference here.

The Bulls (92.5%) have the better lineout (Reds 89.8%) but the Reds scrum (94%) is streets ahead of the Bulls (80%) who are second worst in the comp surprisingly.

I don't know how much it skews the stats but it's worth noting that the attacking stats for the Reds in the first two rounds were dismal and there has been a marked improvement from round 3 on.

Could it be that after all this time Scoey is really Michael Foley and is now planning to make a play for the Reds coaching spot. Take your statistics elsewhere sir.

 

[Scoey]

Harsh. I've been called many things over the years but never has anyone gone as far as to call me Michael Foley.

You can rest assured, that I am not Axel, nor am I interested in the Reds HC gig. I'm just a guy that loves rugby and numbers. You're all just lucky I can't work out how to imbed pie charts, histograms and radar graphs into forum posts. #statsarefun

 

[oztimmay]

Harsh. I've been called many things over the years but never has anyone gone as far as to call me Michael Foley.

You can rest assured, that I am not Axel, nor am I interested in the Reds HC gig. I'm just a guy that loves rugby and numbers. You're all just lucky I can't work out how to imbed pie charts, histograms and radar graphs into forum posts. #statsarefun

Save them as an image and upload?

 

[Scoey]

Haha! Tongue in cheek. Although I have been known to stat the shit out of upcoming games or tournaments on occasion it's not a regular thing. That's probably how I'd do it though if I was ever taken by their numbery beauty enough to share with the world!

 

[Hawko]

I'm as happy as everyone else to see the Bulls finally playing some Rugby but their position on the ladder has been helped significantly by their draw. 2 of their 3 away games were against the bottom 2 teams in the comp.

I'm not saying that the Reds are all of a sudden world beaters, or that we've had a tough draw but this could be closer than the ladder positions of the two teams suggest. Bulls should be firm favourites but a lot will come down to whether the Reds can replicate the first half form from last week.

Some more stats...
The Bulls (19) are ahead of the Reds (10) in tries scored but trailing the Reds in defenders beaten and clean breaks (118 to 112 and 54 to 43 respectively).

The Bulls (92.5%) have the better lineout (Reds 89.8%) but the Reds scrum (94%) is streets ahead of the Bulls (80%) who are second worst in the comp surprisingly.

I don't know how much it skews the stats but it's worth noting that the attacking stats for the Reds in the first two rounds were dismal and there has been a marked improvement from round 3 on.

Not only have the Bulls played the two bottom teams but they got a lot of help from the Rebels who had an absolute "mare" in their game.

I expect to see Nyakane start this week to shore up the Bulls scrum.

The other thing skewing these stats, as you alluded to earlier, is the quality of the opposition the Bulls have faced so far. I think this game is almost in the "too hard to pick" category.

 

[Scoey]

I'm not confident that we can get it done at Loftus. The travel and altitude will probably be the difference but on paper the teams are close. Go you REDS!!!

 

[No4918]

Had the Reds not surprised the Clan we may have been a chance to beat the Bulls but that looks very unlikely now at Loftus. A bonus point loss will be a moral victory and hopefully the resident statistician can spin it to sound like we really were unlucky not to win.