Northern Edition

Select Edition

Northern Northern
Southern Southern
Global Global
New Zealand New Zealand
France France

'It's a change-up': Reds boss Brad Thorn relishing COVID-enforced stay away from home

(Photo by Teaukura Moetaua/Getty Images)

Table-topping Queensland feel swapping Cape Town for Coogee could work in their favour as they prepare to take on Melbourne in their Super Rugby AU clash at AAMI Park on Saturday night.

ADVERTISEMENT

The Reds travelled to Melbourne on Thursday night from Sydney, where they’ve spent the week after being forced to stay on following their win over the Waratahs after Brisbane was hit by a COVID-19 outbreak.

With South Africa no longer part of the Super Rugby competition and the long-haul trips that came with it, Reds coach Brad Thorn said his team were embracing some time together on the road.

Video Spacer

James O’Connor speaks to media ahead of Rebels clash

Video Spacer

James O’Connor speaks to media ahead of Rebels clash

“It’s not the end of the world to be stuck at Coogee, it’s a nice spot, it’s a change-up,” Thorn said on Thursday.

“With Super Rugby AU it’s not like normal Super Rugby where you go to Africa for a couple of weeks – that used to be a challenging trip but it was also a good bonding time for the team so in a way it’s been a positive thing.”

The Reds can at least travel home after the match after the Brisbane lockdown was lifted and will host the Brumbies Saturday week.

Queensland will be without star winger Suliasi Vunivalu in a blow for their attack given the ex-Melbourne Storm flyer knows AAMI Park intimately after his years with the NRL premiers.

ADVERTISEMENT

Suffering a hamstring injury, Thorn expected him to be sidelined for up to three weeks.

In their last clash, the Reds pipped the Rebels by two points, with five-eighth Matt Toomua missing a penalty kick after regulation time to win it for the visitors

Thorn acknowledged that the Rebels had improved since that round two meeting.

“It’s always a tough contest – we saw they were buoyed to be finally back at home playing and they will be excited about that,” Thorn said.

“They have improved as we see them as a really big challenge and we’re going to have to be on our game to go down there and get the result that they want.”

ADVERTISEMENT

LIVE

{{item.title}}

Trending on RugbyPass

Comments

0 Comments
Be the first to comment...

Join free and tell us what you really think!

Sign up for free
ADVERTISEMENT

Latest Features

Comments on RugbyPass

J
JW 1 hour ago
Why England's defence of the realm has crumbled without Felix Jones

This piece is nothing more than the result of revisionist fancy of Northern Hemisphere rugby fans. Seeing what they want to see, helped but some surprisingly good results and a desire to get excited about doing something well.


I went back through the 6N highlights and sure enough in every English win I remembered seeing these exact holes on the inside, that are supposedly the fallout out of a Felix Jones system breaking down in the hands of some replacement. Every time the commentators mentioned England being targeted up the seam/around the ruck or whatever. Each game had a try scored on the inside of the blitz, no doubt it was a theme throughout all of their games. Will Jordan specifically says that Holland had design that move to target space he saw during their home series win.


Well I'm here to tell you they were the same holes in a Felix Jones system being built as well. This woe is now sentiment has got to stop. The game is on a high, these games have been fantastic! It is Englands attack that has seen their stocks increase this year, and no doubt that is what SB told him was the teams priority. Or it's simply science, with Englands elite players having worked towards a new player welfare and management system, as part of new partnership with the ERU, that's dictating what the players can and can't put their bodies through.


The only bit of truth in this article is that Felix is not there to work on fixing his defence. England threw away another good chance of winning in the weekend when they froze all enterprise under pressure when no longer playing attacking footy for the second half. That mindset helped (or not helped if you like) of course by all this knee jerk, red brained criticism.

32 Go to comments
TRENDING
TRENDING Why World Cup winner doesn’t blame All Black for leaving New Zealand Why World Cup winner doesn’t blame All Black for leaving New Zealand
Search