Rocky?

[cyclopath]

This is probably going to sound dumb but im just going to throw it out there. Ever thought about making elsom a lock, he's tall enough!, then we could have pocock at 6 and smith at 7. That would solve the breakdown problem! why not get adventurous

Erm, no it wouldn't. 2 fetchers have not really worked previously for us, and I fail to see why it would now. Our breakdown issue is not lack of pilferers, but lack of concerted aggression and counter-rucking, and cleaning out loitering opposition forwards spinning and flopping where they ought not.
Also reducing our lineout jumpers to 2 would not exactly help our far from stellar performance in that department (remember, Palu doesn't jump).

 

[naza]

This is probably going to sound dumb but im just going to throw it out there. Ever thought about making elsom a lock, he's tall enough!, then we could have pocock at 6 and smith at 7. That would solve the breakdown problem! why not get adventurous

Erm, no it wouldn't. 2 fetchers have not really worked previously for us, and I fail to see why it would now. Our breakdown issue is not lack of pilferers, but lack of concerted aggression and counter-rucking, and cleaning out loitering opposition forwards spinning and flopping where they ought not.
Also reducing our lineout jumpers to 2 would not exactly help our far from stellar performance in that department (remember, Palu doesn't jump).

This, and your reply, should be a sticky.

I love the logic though. Shit, why not 5 opensides ?

 

[Pfitzy]

Not that much differences in terms of backrow competition in Europe and the southern hemisphere - David Wallace, Stephen Ferris, Imanol Harinordoquay, Sergio Parisse, Thierry Dusautoir et al are as good as [if not better in the latter two cases] than anything in the Tri-Nations bar McCaw*.

Its not just about quality of players - the talents in Europe are more widely dispersed. While there may be good back rowers, there aren't many great combinations of back rowers. Elsom also ran fairly wide and in broken play a lot when he got noticed by the commentators i.e. at backs.