Waratahs 2013

[qwerty51]

Tahs should definatly look at signing Sam Lane for next year. He's Sydney based isn't he?

haha no. All he does is kick.

 

[tigerland12]

haha no. All he does is kick.

So he'd fit in right?

 

[Brumbies Guy]

haha no. All he does is kick.

So he already knows the game plan, perfect.

 

[Bowside]

At least he kicks well.

 

[tranquility]

haha no. All he does is kick.

I know you were probably just having a laugh, but it is disappointing when young players get pigeon holed and TC treatment so early on. The bloke has played one game, without a pre-season, in a then top of the table derby clash.. I am sure he will be a fantastic distributor and develop a handy running game.

 

[Lee Grant]

Sam is a good talent and played with some panache in his first game, but with a couple of major knee operations in as many years Super teams will be wary of recruiting him.

As for getting a flyhalf: there's not a lot around, in Sydney. The bones have been picked out of the good ones, which is how it should be. Harvey was the last one standing.

Rohan Saifolio has been here for a couple of years and played for the Tahs Juniors last year. The former Oz Schools flyhalf played a lot of fullback last season for Southerns but he is currently at 10; so he might develop.

Talking of Oz schools they have not produced a lot of star talent since To'omua in the position; not that being a big name in schools rugby is all that important sometimes, thank goodness. I said Matt played like a brown Noddy at the time, and though he is nowhere near the same standard, he is going OK.

Oh, for school years like 2005. Before the season I wrote on rugby forums that it was going to be the year of the flyhalves. Ben Lucas and Christian Leali'ifano the flyhalves from the previous year were returning to school, a 15 y.o. Kurtley Beale had missed the 2004 season rep games with a bad ankle and would likely supersede the other two, and there was new kid from Qld I hadn't seen, Quade Cooper.

Later that year I opined that these 4 would take Australian rugby forward when they matured as rugby players and the best of them would be very good indeed.

Not too far off the mark, but I digress.
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[vidiot]

Unless I have it completely backwards Deans predicted last week we would see B. Foley at 10 (and Barnes at 15) for the Waratahs by the end of the season. It seems logical enough? How does he go there for Uni and is he a serious option in 2013?

(I have a little stash of Robbie Deans comments locked in my tiny Qld brain after inviting myself to an evening with Robbie the night before the Reds/Stormers game. They're devaluing by the day!)

 

[Bruce Ross]

Unless I have it completely backwards Deans predicted last week we would see B. Foley at 10 (and Barnes at 15) for the Waratahs by the end of the season. It seems logical enough? How does he go there for Uni and is he a serious option in 2013?

Obviously these are two players at very different stages of their careers. I have watched Foley since he joined Sydney Uni where he spent IIRR three years in Colts learning his craft. I'm a bit old school but I regard him as having a fairly complete kit of tools for the classic five-eighth's role. There are vastly more players who wear 10 on their jersey than there are competent five-eighths.

I think that Barnes is a gifted footballer who would be better suited at 15 than at either 10 or 12.

But what would I know? I have never played at the Super level so by definition I cannot even comprehend what is happening at such an exalted level. I often feel like an impostor just watching the games.
.

 

[suckerforred]

Obviously these are two players at very different stages of their careers. I have watched Foley since he joined Sydney Uni where he spent IIRR three years in Colts learning his craft. I'm a bit old school but I regard him as having a fairly complete kit of tools for the classic five-eighth's role. There are vastly more players who wear 10 on their jersey than there are competent five-eighths.

I think that Barnes is a gifted footballer who would be better suited at 15 than at either 10 or 12.

But what would I know? I have never played at the Super level so by definition I cannot even comprehend what is happening at such an exalted level. I often feel like an impostor just watching the games.
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I agree with most things that you say Bruce, but here I will have to disagree. I think that BB is better as a 12 then anywhere else, although he does make a fair fist of the other two positions. I like his game as a 12. Just wish he would play there more often.

As to your last comment, re being an imposter, I think that you know more then you credit yourself with.

 

[Richo]

15 at club level, 12 at Super level, 10 at test level. He's a conundrum, young Berrick.

 

[Bruce Ross]

I agree with most things that you say Bruce, but here I will have to disagree. I think that BB is better as a 12 then anywhere else, although he does make a fair fist of the other two positions. I like his game as a 12. Just wish he would play there more often.

15 at club level, 12 at Super level, 10 at test level. He's a conundrum, young Berrick.

My views on Berrick became more definite after I watched him at 12 in Rounds 3 and 4 against the Highlanders and Force, respectively. In both games the Waratahs' backs lacked structure in both defensive and attacking alignments. That convinced me he is not an organiser but more an instinctive player. This fits in with a fairly general perception that he is more effective as a Test player than at Super level. In internationals a player basically just has to focus on handling their own position given that those around them are very competent.

Everyone seems to realise the controlling role that the five-eighth plays but in my opinion the 12 also has organisational responsibilities. Berrick did not have the opportunity to serve an adequate apprenticeship in rugby and I think it shows. His schooling was at Ipswich Grammar where I presume he played some rugby but it is also an important rugby league nursery. He then went straight to the Brisbane Broncos and after two years joined the Reds. By going straight into professional football he missed important formative years that other players have playing club rugby.

I would be fascinated to see how he would perform at 13. It's not going to happen but I think it would be a worthwhile experiment this week to have Hangers at 10, Berrick at 13 and AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper) at 15.
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[Richo]

Isn't he a bit small for 13?

 

[RedsHappy]

....I think that Barnes is a gifted footballer who would be better suited at 15 than at either 10 or 12.....

I actually think this is potentially a quite brilliant suggestion and, with a coach of flair and imagination, well worth trying.

Partly I say this as, over the last 4 or so years watching BB I have become quite convinced that he has a deep-seated anxiety issue that comes out in pressure situations when his (excellent) natural game intelligence doesn't have time to process data fast enough for him to make and execute the right instinctive move. I think he's deep down a very sensitive fella, always wanting to do precisely the right thing, but not quite regularly enough ending up doing it quickly or intuitively enough. The latent genius of a QC (Quade Cooper) at 10 is that his intuition and resulting skill execution is typically instantaneous and without contemplation and his regular instinctive choice is often a very good to superb one, certainly at S15 level. In the micro second that QC (Quade Cooper) decides and acts, BB thinks, then worries, then acts. The 'sookface' tag has more acute revelation than its teasing intends.

Placing BB back that bit at 15, giving more 'solo' time or less instant opportunity for a weight of pressure on him to control the game or enable his 10 or 13, but the time to think back on his own just a tad longer, will IMO permit his best skills to flow more freely with relatively less focus to be on him, and his terrific skills will unfold in a better winning delivery. He's a wonderful long kicker and with outstanding field vision and field opportunity assessment when he's not anxious and has that fraction more time to consider what he wants to do and where. And from 15 he can come up as second play maker in the right contexts and set plays; again, in that backing up role, the anxiety and control expectation is subtly less.

Related to all this is why he's by and large been a poor investment for the Tahs. At a young age, he was to come to Sydney and set the peak of NSW rugby alight in a high pressure playing role. It was a big, holistic pressure that his inner character and natural talent could not contain, and a form of retreat and sub-optimal outcomes have resulted. Btw, I am also convinced that some injury patterns - or greater proneness to injury - can result from psychosomatic sources.

 

[tranquility]

Outstanding post.

 

[Inside Shoulder]

At least he kicks well.

right...well that rules him out

 

[Inside Shoulder]

I actually think this is potentially a quite brilliant suggestion and, with a coach of flair and imagination, well worth trying.

right...well that rules that out

NEXT

 

[matty_k]

Palu signed a one year deal
http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-new...tml?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

 

[Lee Grant]

Translated that means that Cliffy wants to stay around to play against the Lions and will then be gone.

By the time he leaves Lopeti should be up to speed if the Tahs keep him.

 

[fatprop]

The kiss of death

NSW Waratahs won't be sacking coach Michael Foley, chief executive Jason Allen confirms

• By Wayne Smith
• The Australian
• May 22, 2012 9:22AM

Feeling the heat ... Foley has the backing of the board despite a disastrous first season. Source: News Limited
New South Wales Waratahs chief executive Jason Allen insists his franchise will not be pressured into sacking coach Michael Foley.

​

The last realistic hope the Waratahs had of reaching the Super Rugby play-offs in Foley's first season as head coach evaporated on the weekend when they were beaten 19-13 by the competition-leading Stormers in Cape Town, their fourth straight loss and their eighth in 12 games.
That left them in 11th place on the table, which would be galling enough under any circumstances but especially so when last year's wooden-spooners, Melbourne Rebels, moved one place ahead of them with a one-point win over Western Force in Perth on Sunday.

​

It was the sixth time this season that the Waratahs have collected a consolation bonus point by finishing within seven of their opponents - two of their first three losses being by a point - but that's not a statistic that has persuaded his critics to cut Foley any slack.
Allen admitted he was well aware of public and media calls for Foley, indeed for the entire Waratahs coaching staff, to be sacked but he was adamant that would not be happening.

​

"Our plan is definitely that he is there again next season," Allen said.
"We're not shirking the fact that there are performance issues. I can feel the public sentiment, although we are also getting plenty of calls of support for Foley.
"We've got to look at the ways we can improve. Some change is required but we're not going to get irrational and start chopping heads.
"We employed 'Foles' because we are confident in his capacity to deliver. The score is not on the scoreboard yet but we believe that can be turned around."
Every side has its hard-luck and injury stories but even before the season started, the Waratahs were blighted by bad luck, having to go into the campaign without their two strike wingers Drew Mitchell and Lachie Turner and without their captain Rocky Elsom and main lineout hope Dan Vickerman.
"I think one of the issues we've had has been the maintenance of players," Allen said. "We've had to play our top players this year without being able to rotate them."
That, inevitably, had led to further breakages, to the point that against the Stormers, the Waratahs had their fourth-choice hooker Josh Mann-Rea sitting on the bench.
Adding injury to further insult is the likely loss of lock Dean Mumm for the clash with the Cheetahs in Bloemfontein after he sustained a head knock, while Elsom and Sitaleki Timani both have shoulder concerns.
Although Foley generally has had the Tahs playing a more exciting brand of rugby than last season, he deliberately switched to a heavy field-position game against the Stormers in an attempt to mimic the tactics that earned Queensland Reds and the Crusaders impressive victories in Cape Town last year.
The tactics might have been appropriate but their execution left a lot to be desired, with Berrick Barnes endlessly hoisting high, midfield bombs that more often than not the Stormers happily accepted to turn the pressure back on to the Tahs.

 

[Joe Mac]

Stop blaming the injuries and blame the coach who bought a group on injury prone over-priced has-been's, instead of investing in the development of future talent...