Recap: Super Rugby Pacific opening night blog

E pai ana o korero TJ.

Bugger being the one to tell a guy he's off in his last game lol

Normally they rate them a bit lower if they have no impact don't they. Dmac came on and only really performed better as a 10, when he came into that role from fullback, where he just commits defenders and did a couple of nice flat passes. Otherwise as a fb replacement, very ineffectual (not really saying much in a game like this).

I really hope that Razor is just conserving Dmac because he's going to have no off season (going to top14 supposedly) and will return him to 10 next year. Otherwise just please please oh lord just give him to Toshiba in a swap to get the Mo'ongu signing over the line for next year (too late now).

I don't think I can handle an more of these selections.

Clearly, we are rebuilding from the floor up. But the one place that the Boks are not "miles ahead" is on the paddock. A brand new, relatively untested coaching team, with a new team still in the making, came close in Sth Africa.

Change takes time. Whatever this magic instant innovation potion is you allude to, it doesn't exist. Just ask Rassie. It's taken the Boks years to develop. I've no doubt Razor will get us there.

Ted & Shag were both about 85% I think, Foster at 78% & Razor at 71%. The implication was, of course, that Razor hadn't done as well as the others.

A closer look though shows Foster's first 14 tests were v AUS (7) ARG (4) FIJ (2) & TON (1). There was no explanation about this, despite the obvious discrepancy rendering the "statistics" completely useless. Not good enough.

But, some of the games we were losing were from schoolboy errors, or downright confusion. Either the players were really dumb (they weren’t) or they were poorly coached. Given the repetitive nature of errors, brain fades, poor decision making, & loose structures, this all lands with the coaching group.

With only six playoff spots now in SR, & Aussie franchises now consolidated to four, 2025 looks like a tight one. I'm picking we'll have to tough it out under Penney & hope for the best.

The amount of inconsistency with the head contact law coming into the game. No red yesterday and no yellow today, but then another player gets a suspension for a side on headonhead (as apposed to these two sweet shoulders) contact last week. Happy if there is a referee change to having a bit more commensense.

And I expected ITA to play exactly how they did. Make the game messy, high physicality, stop-start, & ride the crowd. I didn't see any jaded players, you just need to see how strong our D was. A temperature of zero degrees & a slippery ball certainly didn't help.