Reds vs Stormers, Newlands 2013

[Ruggo]

This game is going to be intrguing. I think Ant will stay at 12 and CFS will stay at 13. I have no idea how we will choose to play them but they are there for the taking. I wouldn't be suprised to see Radike start this one. I think we will bounce back from the Cheetahs game.

Bring it on.

 

[gel]

A big game indeed. Very crucial to the reds finals hopes (as are every game from here on in ). Stormers will no doubt be stinging from their defeat to the rebels, whilst he reds will no doubt be ruing what might have been against the Cheetahs.

I just cannot tell what the reds will be thinking.

 

[Tangawizi]

Reds better be thinking that it's a must win match, as they'll drop out of the play-off spots otherwise.

Wouldn't be surprised to see us go for a 5-2 split on the bench this week. Maybe Hanson to start.

 

[gel]

http://www.couriermail.com.au/sport...with-knee-injury/story-fn8t7efs-1226646614081

Not a great start to the week.

 

[Penguin]

In the Reds favour, not at altitude & they'll be more settled into the timezone/jetlag etc. I think the 40 hour flight with the associated delays screwed their preparation last week. The Stormers aren't the same as past years & if the Reds play like they did against the Sharks 1st half they should waltz it in.
Diggers is always a big loss but the depth is there to cover him.

 

[Tangawizi]

I don't think Stormers have been that far away actually. A 1 from 4 tour record doesnt sound great but they were only a point away from the Blues and then a few minutes off winning both the Tahs & Rebels matches.

They also did a very good job of stitching up the brumbies at newlands this season. Reds really need to be on their game this weekend.

 

[RedsHappy]

Guys, it cannot be the case that the Deans-QC (Quade Cooper) dramas of recent days have zero affect on the Reds coaches' and team sentiment and mood, especially after today's extraordinary conjoining of poor Taps into the QC (Quade Cooper)-failings-which-must-be-worked-on-in-the-next-few-weeks or else list from The Master Coach.

You'd have to be an insider to know if this will galvanize and fire the team positively in support of Quade and their own breed, or the opposite will occur - neutral it surely will not be, not after this.

You'd really though have to speculate that Quade - the exemplar confidence player who's flourished under Link's guidance and obvious loyalty - will after today's latest advisory input (making him directly responsible for his teammate's decline) enter a somewhat distressed and demoralized state, even if this is not revealed to us all. I mean, which professional sportsman would not, irrespective of whether the outside observer likes the object of the national coach's public critique.

 

[USARugger]

Don't see Hanson starting just yet. Saia plays his best rugby both at Super Rugby and internationally against the South Africans (I have no idea why).

Reds to come out firing. QC (Quade Cooper) and CFS to expose the Stormers midfield which is all name and no game.

Reds line out will survive the Bekker onslaught but will not excel, we will fight for parity all game but will not slide down the mountain.

Kitschoff has me worried about our scrum, he has been scrummaging well recently.

 

[Jets]

It will be interesting to see if Taps starts and they shift CFS to the wing or just replace Ioane with Shippers or Moz.

I actually thought Moz was good at 15 last week and think he deserves to keep his spot.

As for Cooper being effected by Deans' comments, I doubt it. I don't think Robbies opinion is very high on Quade's list of things to worry about. If Deans is re-signed the that will change but Quade is happy to play the waiting game.

 

[USARugger]

CFS has been too good to move. No way.

If Taps is coming in it will be at the expense of Ant but CFS has been stellar the past two weeks and is looking like he might make the 13 jersey his this year.

Agree that Moz looked good at 15. Kind of a cruel irony he's finally getting these starts now, huh?

 

[No4918]

I think they will bring Taps in and move CFS to the wing but i hope they don't. Please move Shipperley to the wing and leave Moz at the back.

 

[Pfitzy]

The Rebels showed how to dick the Stormers and their much vaunted defence. In fact, the Reds did that very same thing against the Chiefs last year in Brisbane.

Pick and go.

While the strategy of the Stormers to fan out is great against teams who just want to chuck it wide, Link will probably instruct Sanchez and Cooper to set up a wide play, then let the centres and forwards crash it up in close. Pour through the breach in numbers and let the wingers or Cooper/Genia finish things off, going wide once the defence is wrong-footed

The Rebels did this, and made the Tahs' efforts of the previous week look difficult.

The great thing about this is you've got the pace to compete with the Stormers, and much more creativity. They've had to fly back, and while they'll be at home, your blokes can't possibly play as bad as they did last week. About four times in the first half I saw Genia put the ball well above Quade's head, and you can't blame that on altitude.

 

[Jets]

I'm expecting a much better showing from the Reds this week. I can put last week down to a horrendous 40 hour trip to SA. They need to be much more clinical and not panic. This rubbish about no pick and drive has to be looked at. There are times when it works and times when it doesn't. They need to mix things up a bit.

In 2011 the Reds played a different style each week. Teams would plan for one thing and be hit by something else. We need to return to this style. Start the game attacking the 10 channel with big forwards then switch it up and go wide. The Stormers aren't the team they have been in past years. Their defence has holes in it. We need to exploit these holes and consolidate when a break is made. We don't need to score off ever break.

Also we need to kick some bloody points. A few field goals wouldn't go astray either. The more ways we score the harder it is for teams to defend against us.

It seems like they wont look back to see what worked in 2011. It was simple but effective.

 

[RedsHappy]

I have 'fear in my heart' re this game and now, potentially, whether we can hold a top 6 position at the pre-Finals point.

After this season of, generally, very mediocre try-scoring rates, clearly there is something endemically amiss within the Reds' 2013 coaching group (and possibly playing group, though I rate that less likely) re its ability to design strategies to get the Reds' attacking capabilities back to their 2011-best, but necessarily adapted and improved for the changed competitive conditions in 2013, the standards and styles of the S15 are not static. We are now well into this season, and we're barely improving in attack success, and in some respects a la the Cheetahs game we are going backwards. As I've said before, the Sharks 1H success has something of the flat track bully success about it, the Sharks were injury-decimated and showing all the consequences in that and prior games. The fact that we could not sustain that form of play and its results vs the Cheetahs was very telling, sadly.

I'm speculating, but I sense the whole Link departure process and related factors has somehow impacted an intensive coaches' focus, creativity, inner balance of skills and the manner of working together, something essential has been lost from 2011 I feel sure (btw, I felt the same through much of 2012's season). We are just holding on, we are not re-championing our capabilities as it were. I actually think our 'just getting there, not knocking sides over' is sort of sapping the Reds players' insides, they're slowly and subtly losing little bits of the self-confidence and optimism that's so crucial to continued attacking guile and positive execution.

I am also genuinely concerned that Deans' wholly inept and unbelievably ill-judged interventions and 'explanations' re QC (Quade Cooper) and QC (Quade Cooper) and Taps etc (and all that derives from this BIL squad process) will damage QC (Quade Cooper)'s own morale and motivation and potentially that of numerous other Reds players. Lutton's recent piece notes that QC (Quade Cooper)'s friends are saying the process re him in/out BIL is now taking its 'emotional toll on Quade'. Lutton is well connected with the Reds.

Allied to which is the certainty that the Stormers at home - jet-lagged or not - will be desperate to win this game, their ferocity will be immense and their home record is good. They are a very rigid and in many ways badly uncreative side, but I think they'll learn something from their errors on tour, they are by no means stupid, history shows that.

I like my team support to have solid rational foundations to underpin the emotive ones. Those former foundations are suffering today.

 

[bloodred]

Here's an emotive one: "Reds by 15"

 

[PaarlBok]

Stormers will use this match to start building their team for the CC. Reds players are to fancy for our lot. Reds by 50 easily.

 

[Hugh Jarse]

So you think a close one then Boet?

 

[PaarlBok]

So you think a close one then Boet?

nah I am finish with the Stormers now. Once you are out, everything change, best to start build for the next competition. My best hope for the SA teams are the Cheetahs.

 

[Scrubber2050]

RedsHappy,
agree with much of your post.
I can only say that Quade is a youngt bloke who loves playing rugby and in particular playing with his MATEs at the Reds.
I think the whilst the confidence thing is real, he is professional enough to be able to lift for his teamates and State. Actually think he will have a blinder this week to directly confront ALL the critics (and there are plenty).
Link and the whole team know this is the pointy end of the season and all will be focussed on a good win

 

[Rassie]

I think I have found a strategy for the Stormers to score tries. All they need is a Nonu, Kaino and a McCaw