waratahjesus
Greg Davis (50)
They obviously don't have an operational budget for increased staff so get someone with a vested interest in performing in the role for free. It's not a guy off the street hoping to get an autograph
Waratahs 2012
- Thread starter Lee Grant
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They obviously don't have an operational budget for increased staff so get someone with a vested interest in performing in the role for free. It's not a guy off the street hoping to get an autograph
Jnor
Peter Fenwicke (45)
It's almost universal in the Australian media for people to be doing unpaid internships. Obviously it depends on the organisation as to how useful and/or productive they are for both parties but it's my understanding that this has been the situation for a fair while and I guess the PR industry is just the same.
Maybe, just maybe, the fact that any media in Aus seems to be hard-pressed to make a quid (and actually hire new staff) might have something to do with its prevalence
Inside Shoulder
Nathan Sharpe (72)
I suppose an unpaid intern in PR at the Tahs would learn a lot and quickly about dealing with dissatisfied customers and media...
Hawko
Tony Shaw (54)
Some things I'd really like to know about the Tah squad:
- Has Ducka Caldwell retired due to illness or is he still trying to come back? I know he's not in this year's squad but he would be great back-up for our locks who appear to have injury/availability issues.
- Has BKH's ""niggle" resolved itself or is he still on the injury list?
- Has Kepu's eye injury cleared up?
- What is TPN's physical condition like, given that it still appeared to be inadequate on the EOYT?
- Will Benn Robinson be right to go from round 1?
- Last I heard, Vickerman was a round 4 or 5 proposal after the shoulder surgery. Is this still on track?
- When does S. Timani return from Japan?
- What is the state of Rocky's hamstring injury? Will he have to be nursed through the season?
- Same question for Palu's injury.
- Last I heard, Mitchell was going to be ready for round 3. Is this still on track?
- What's the status on Horne's hamstrings?
- How are the backs being trained? Are they being taught how to operate close to the gain line?
- Have the tackle bags all been kitted up in red jumpers?
Inside Shoulder
Nathan Sharpe (72)
was mitchell's injury anymore than a hamstring?
Lee Grant
John Eales (66)
Hawko - those were all good questions, which I would like answered also.
I think that Gaff will have the backs playing flat when it is appropriate to do so except that Barnes, by nature a tactical flyhalf, likes to play a bit deeper. Noddy Lynagh was the same; so it is not the worst thing in the world, but these days with league defensive practices over the last 13 years or so, you need to do something different.
The Tahs have never really succeeded in being innovative in their backline in the pro era, certainly not under Hickey or McKenzie and I can't recall that Dwyer ever had his Tahs following his Randwick precepts to the letter either. Mind you he didn't have any great flyhalves to work with.
Playing flat in itself is not the answer: you need receivers running flat to the tackle line too and more importantly aiming themselves at gaps, or swerving or side stepping to them before they get the ball - even whilst the ball is on it's way to them - or running with the flight of the ball before taking it, BOD style.
You also need a Quade or Bernie type long passer and team mates who can read the pass.
Playing flat can have great benefits with the right players but I am not sure if the Tahs have them. Never mind; Gaffney will know that playing flat is over-rated with such personnel and will use other, simpler methods.
Having two waves of attack, decoy running and cut-out passes are the bread and butter of modern back lines and the Tahs can do those things as well as anybody. Offloads, yes, but even the Poms can do that. What I would like to see from the Tahs backs is that they have obviously practised looping moves for hours and hours and hours in pre-season and they have kept doing it once the season started. Bob Dwyer would nod in approval.
When Beale was at school at Joeys he looped all the time as flyhalf, and often too much, but it had top results against opponents even if they were expecting it. When he got to the Tahs, I can't recall that he did it once playing flyhalf though he probably did - or twice. Looping creates a hole that isn't there and if some smart arse defender is there, the fullback can be deadly coming in at the hip of the looping player; or it can be a set move anyway. Oz rugby seems to have forgotten this old, old manoeuvre.
When I was a young bloke Aussie backs over-used the scissors, or switch moves, but now it's hardly ever used at all unless there is a break out and play is in the open. It used to be the means to open play up. Gaffney should have players walk through, and trot then canter through the moves until they become second nature. The angle of direction change should be slight at first, then get bigger, but not too big.
Looping and switching could be used as part of pre-season conditioning of the backs too: instead of running in a straight line up and down the field they could do straightish scissors or loops in three man pods with a ball in their hands, at pace. Rocket science? No.
Support play is also poor in Australia now. We used to have an advantage a while back watching Terry Lamb and fellows long before him on TV supporting the ball runner in a football code that had only 13 defenders in it. We found out that it even worked with 15 defenders. We were good at it; now we are not. In Turner and Carter the Tahs have players who would chase a stick all day if they were dogs, but too many Tahs are not so diligent.
There's a lot more I would like to add but this is long enough - well, maybe just one more thing as Columbo used to say. Watch the old Wallaby games of 30 years ago and see how close to each other the backs were and how effective the short passing game was. Long passes such as JOC (James O'Connor) sent to Turner in the last test match are fine and can have a good result, but only if the receiver is running to space. Much better otherwise to use shorter passes to make defenders prop.
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I was enthused when I found out about the hiring of Gaffney, one of the long line of Randwick coaches going back to Towers and Meagher (well Towers was more of a coaching guru than a coach himself.)
I think that Gaff will have the backs playing flat when it is appropriate to do so except that Barnes, by nature a tactical flyhalf, likes to play a bit deeper. Noddy Lynagh was the same; so it is not the worst thing in the world, but these days with league defensive practices over the last 13 years or so, you need to do something different.
The Tahs have never really succeeded in being innovative in their backline in the pro era, certainly not under Hickey or McKenzie and I can't recall that Dwyer ever had his Tahs following his Randwick precepts to the letter either. Mind you he didn't have any great flyhalves to work with.
Playing flat in itself is not the answer: you need receivers running flat to the tackle line too and more importantly aiming themselves at gaps, or swerving or side stepping to them before they get the ball - even whilst the ball is on it's way to them - or running with the flight of the ball before taking it, BOD style.
You also need a Quade or Bernie type long passer and team mates who can read the pass.
Playing flat can have great benefits with the right players but I am not sure if the Tahs have them. Never mind; Gaffney will know that playing flat is over-rated with such personnel and will use other, simpler methods.
Having two waves of attack, decoy running and cut-out passes are the bread and butter of modern back lines and the Tahs can do those things as well as anybody. Offloads, yes, but even the Poms can do that. What I would like to see from the Tahs backs is that they have obviously practised looping moves for hours and hours and hours in pre-season and they have kept doing it once the season started. Bob Dwyer would nod in approval.
When Beale was at school at Joeys he looped all the time as flyhalf, and often too much, but it had top results against opponents even if they were expecting it. When he got to the Tahs, I can't recall that he did it once playing flyhalf though he probably did - or twice. Looping creates a hole that isn't there and if some smart arse defender is there, the fullback can be deadly coming in at the hip of the looping player; or it can be a set move anyway. Oz rugby seems to have forgotten this old, old manoeuvre.
When I was a young bloke Aussie backs over-used the scissors, or switch moves, but now it's hardly ever used at all unless there is a break out and play is in the open. It used to be the means to open play up. Gaffney should have players walk through, and trot then canter through the moves until they become second nature. The angle of direction change should be slight at first, then get bigger, but not too big.
Looping and switching could be used as part of pre-season conditioning of the backs too: instead of running in a straight line up and down the field they could do straightish scissors or loops in three man pods with a ball in their hands, at pace. Rocket science? No.
Support play is also poor in Australia now. We used to have an advantage a while back watching Terry Lamb and fellows long before him on TV supporting the ball runner in a football code that had only 13 defenders in it. We found out that it even worked with 15 defenders. We were good at it; now we are not. In Turner and Carter the Tahs have players who would chase a stick all day if they were dogs, but too many Tahs are not so diligent.
There's a lot more I would like to add but this is long enough - well, maybe just one more thing as Columbo used to say. Watch the old Wallaby games of 30 years ago and see how close to each other the backs were and how effective the short passing game was. Long passes such as JOC (James O'Connor) sent to Turner in the last test match are fine and can have a good result, but only if the receiver is running to space. Much better otherwise to use shorter passes to make defenders prop.
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Bruce Ross
Ken Catchpole (46)
A nice piece of analysis, LG.
Inside Shoulder
Nathan Sharpe (72)
Agree with Bruce.
LG - If you saw KB (Kurtley Beale) loop once or twice when he got to the Tahs you saw something I didnt - I agree, and the youtube stuff shows it brilliantly, that he did a lot of backing the ball up on the loop when at Joeys.
Lets not forget that this type of play rescued the 1991 1/4 (?) final against Ireland when Noddy scored in the corner - despite Spiro's lament that Noddy did not follow the ball enough.
The 5/8s role in Oz now seems to be at first receiver on all phase ball as well as from set piece so he cant run off following the ball hoping for its return.
A move from first phase, even a simple loop, is so rare that it always provokes comment. Its disappearance is no doubt to be blamed on the proposition that if such a move breaks down it will do so further from the pigs than crash ball from first phase and likely behind the gain line: so these things dont withstand the risk averse professional era.
The question is whether it could be re-introduced occasionally as the option play in these conservative times.
LG - If you saw KB (Kurtley Beale) loop once or twice when he got to the Tahs you saw something I didnt - I agree, and the youtube stuff shows it brilliantly, that he did a lot of backing the ball up on the loop when at Joeys.
Lets not forget that this type of play rescued the 1991 1/4 (?) final against Ireland when Noddy scored in the corner - despite Spiro's lament that Noddy did not follow the ball enough.
The 5/8s role in Oz now seems to be at first receiver on all phase ball as well as from set piece so he cant run off following the ball hoping for its return.
A move from first phase, even a simple loop, is so rare that it always provokes comment. Its disappearance is no doubt to be blamed on the proposition that if such a move breaks down it will do so further from the pigs than crash ball from first phase and likely behind the gain line: so these things dont withstand the risk averse professional era.
The question is whether it could be re-introduced occasionally as the option play in these conservative times.
Hawko
Tony Shaw (54)
Lee, There is just no way that hitting the "like" button is sufficient, though I have.
Many Tah fans never saw the Ella brothers at work as a trio. There's probably not much footage around any more, which is a great pity. Watching modern rugby, people no longer know what is possible in backline play. As our old-guy brains atrophy the memory becomes hazier, but we have that lingering feeling that what we see now could be so much more. Watching the Wallaby backline at the World Cup was excruciating for those of us who know what is possible. The first Super team to do it well is going to murder some teams, even those with good defensive coaches, because the element of surprise will leave them gasping.
Your post could be headed perhaps as "How to create space in an area where no space currently exists". The long pass to Turner was only good because space had been created. If your backs run close together then marking defensive teams either get drawn in to create space outside or leave gaps that expose space close in. But space can be closed down if you have time. Flat attack does not allow time to close the gaps.
Maybe the Tah backline does not have the skills but I would at least like someone to try it out. You are right about coaches past, even Dwyer did not achieve it though he got closer than some. With all the classy backs we have had over the years of Super rugby, each year our backlines have been somewhat stilted. So maybe if this year''s crop are less talented (yet unproven) then coaching them to play a wider range of plays will improve the outcomes.
I hope Gaffney is doing what you wrote. A man can live in hope.
Many Tah fans never saw the Ella brothers at work as a trio. There's probably not much footage around any more, which is a great pity. Watching modern rugby, people no longer know what is possible in backline play. As our old-guy brains atrophy the memory becomes hazier, but we have that lingering feeling that what we see now could be so much more. Watching the Wallaby backline at the World Cup was excruciating for those of us who know what is possible. The first Super team to do it well is going to murder some teams, even those with good defensive coaches, because the element of surprise will leave them gasping.
Your post could be headed perhaps as "How to create space in an area where no space currently exists". The long pass to Turner was only good because space had been created. If your backs run close together then marking defensive teams either get drawn in to create space outside or leave gaps that expose space close in. But space can be closed down if you have time. Flat attack does not allow time to close the gaps.
Maybe the Tah backline does not have the skills but I would at least like someone to try it out. You are right about coaches past, even Dwyer did not achieve it though he got closer than some. With all the classy backs we have had over the years of Super rugby, each year our backlines have been somewhat stilted. So maybe if this year''s crop are less talented (yet unproven) then coaching them to play a wider range of plays will improve the outcomes.
I hope Gaffney is doing what you wrote. A man can live in hope.
wamberal
Phil Kearns (64)
Towers was the coach's coach, so the Randwick chaps said.
As for short passing, this is even more important in today's games, usually played at night, often with a slippery ball. Surely professional coaches and players are able to work this out, I scream inwardly, as I watch the interminable fumbling and bumbling.
Lee Grant
John Eales (66)
Hawko - good comments up there including: Flat attack does not allow time to close the gaps. That is the holy grail of the flat attack: if the ball runner has aimed himself at a gap and he is flat to the tackle line he is virtually through the gap when he gets the ball. The Brumbies had a lot of success with this with Bernie as the quarterback and the Reds did too last year with Quade; in fact his flat pass back against the traffic was probably better than Bernie's. There is always a risk with interceptions but there is reward too.
Short passing is also valid in good conditions. Long passes, except those to players likely to run through a gap, just take up too much of the width of the field and also have defenders following the ball, especially if the receiver is too deep to try any deception. The next thing you know both sides are having a foot race towards touch and dealing with the miracle pass before the finish line.
Short passing with a few players obviously closer together and running forward takes up less width of the field. This leaves more width for team mates playing off them to use.
There is room for both long and short passes in a game of rugby union but the long pass is overused. I point the finger at you Bernie Larkham. You were so bloody good at it and your team mates so clued up as to what was going to happen that you made today's players form bad habits.
They should be forced to watch those old grainy videos of the Ella brothers, Hawker and O'Connor, for example, back in the day and appreciate the interplay of 2 or 3 passes back and forth in a pod of 3 players, and its deadly effect. It grabbed the attention of defenders.
Short passing is also valid in good conditions. Long passes, except those to players likely to run through a gap, just take up too much of the width of the field and also have defenders following the ball, especially if the receiver is too deep to try any deception. The next thing you know both sides are having a foot race towards touch and dealing with the miracle pass before the finish line.
Short passing with a few players obviously closer together and running forward takes up less width of the field. This leaves more width for team mates playing off them to use.
There is room for both long and short passes in a game of rugby union but the long pass is overused. I point the finger at you Bernie Larkham. You were so bloody good at it and your team mates so clued up as to what was going to happen that you made today's players form bad habits.
They should be forced to watch those old grainy videos of the Ella brothers, Hawker and O'Connor, for example, back in the day and appreciate the interplay of 2 or 3 passes back and forth in a pod of 3 players, and its deadly effect. It grabbed the attention of defenders.
Gnostic
Mark Ella (57)
I always have a bit of a laugh when I see this. If our modern professionals cannot catch a modern textured synthetic ball with the spray on sticky crap on their hands there is no hope at all they would ever show the handling skills we saw in yesteryear wet or dry with the old smooth leather ball that weighed in at a metric ton by half time playing in the wet.
Gnostic
Mark Ella (57)
Lynagh was a great 10 because he didn't over play his hand. Hid did in fact run at the line regularly (Campo's first try aganst NZ at the RWC '91 came because he committed Fox and Bunce to the tackle by stepping inside and running hard and straight) and scored quite a few tries by backing not the least of which was the one you quoted. Barnes has the skills to be the same sort of player and when you consider how many clean breaks Barnes makes for the number of runs he makes it proves that he has great vision and picks the moments to run.
I like to watch
David Codey (61)
I think they would if they could play against the same defenders.
The defensive structures today cannot be compared to what we saw in the "golden days"
The game has changed forever unfortunately, we now watch a game that sees counter attacks outscoring set piece backline moves 10 to 1, which has everything to do with the quality of the defence, not the lack of quality in attack.
Hawko
Tony Shaw (54)
Further to my list of questions:
It appears the media staff at the Tahs (interns or not) either don't read G&GR or don't think any of the questions should be answered.
It also appears that either the Tah security is unbreachable or that the G&GR community has piss-poor covert intelligence capability.
rugbysmartarse
Alan Cameron (40)
I'm not liking the feel about the tahs this year. The wife pointed out last night that the waratah "big name" signings are on the wrong side of 25, and are not the most dynamic of players either. Barnes is still at serious risk of head injury when playing 18 weeks in a row, especially as everyone now knows this is an issue and will likely target him. We have no solid 7. Our best 6 and 8 wont be ready for the start of the season, and if previous seasons are an indicator we cant rely on them. We have pinched a halfback who had a good rookie year, but is at risk of suffering the Sophomore Blues, being in a new environment halfway around the world. We have replaced Australia most unpredictable attacking back with "Mr Dependable", and word is he will walk into the 15 shirt, as opposed to the 13 where he is better suited (IMO).
I would like to see our first string lineup look something like:
1, Robbo 2, TPN 3, Kepu 4, Timani 5, Vickerman 6, Elsom 7, Alcock 8, Palu 9, Sarel 10, Barnes 11, Turner 12, Horne 13, AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper) 14, Pack O' Lllamas 15, Mitchell
but I suspect it will be more like:
1, Kepu 2, TPN 3, Ryan 4, Mumm 5, Douglas 6, Elsom 7, Alcock 8, Dennis, 9 Sarel 10, Barnes 11, mitchell, 12, Carter 13, horne, 14 Turner 15, AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper)
I would like to see our first string lineup look something like:
1, Robbo 2, TPN 3, Kepu 4, Timani 5, Vickerman 6, Elsom 7, Alcock 8, Palu 9, Sarel 10, Barnes 11, Turner 12, Horne 13, AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper) 14, Pack O' Lllamas 15, Mitchell
but I suspect it will be more like:
1, Kepu 2, TPN 3, Ryan 4, Mumm 5, Douglas 6, Elsom 7, Alcock 8, Dennis, 9 Sarel 10, Barnes 11, mitchell, 12, Carter 13, horne, 14 Turner 15, AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper)
T
TOCC
Guest
I think out of the NSW squad, i am eager to see how the likes of Lopeti Timani and Grayson Hart go..
Im not entirely convinced on Sarel Pretorius to be honest, i think his a good player but im not sure his success at the Cheetahs will be matched at the Waratahs.
On the other hand, the Auckland Blues well renown for letting quality young play-makers and halfback slip through there grasps..
On Lopeti Timani, with his physical attributes alone he has strong potential.
Im not entirely convinced on Sarel Pretorius to be honest, i think his a good player but im not sure his success at the Cheetahs will be matched at the Waratahs.
On the other hand, the Auckland Blues well renown for letting quality young play-makers and halfback slip through there grasps..
On Lopeti Timani, with his physical attributes alone he has strong potential.
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