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[2020 Super Rugby] Round 4 (21-22 February)

....in your opinion

is there some sort of award I'm unaware of for bagging our chances of winning anything? We're not obvious to our new and inexperienced squad...stating we're not going to win anything like its an irrefutable fact is just getting a little tiresome

Obviously its opinion. how can you perceive from that, that it is stated as fact.

Every week i state who is going to win in my predictions, is that fact? no. Does my predictions turn out to be true every week? no

of course he Highlanders can win Super rugby thats sport, underdogs can win, i was clearly stating my opinion though. Still dont think they will make the top 10 though
 
of course he Highlanders can win Super rugby thats sport, underdogs can win, i was clearly stating my opinion though. Still dont think they will make the top 10 though
Exactly. I believe it's possible to be realistic, but have hope at the same time. The Highlanders' first win last week was spectacular, and I'll be rooting like mad for them this weekend, but I also understand that the Crusaders are probably at a different level right now... But like they say in the NFL, "They don't play the games on paper"! But I totally get it, Jabby, that it's tough when it feels like people are all naysayers. Here's hoping for an incredible upset this weekend!
 
Curwin Bosch missed the Hurricanes game because of the death of his mother, This week he is back in our starting team after flying to South Africa and back to NZ.
I dont want to speculate but it seems she must have passed away while he was away on tour (Cant confirm, just seems logical as he was in NZ for The Highlanders match)

Im not sure i want Bosch to play for us this weekend, yea we dont have another backup flyhalf on tour after Boeta got concussed but family should come first now for him, rugby is irrelevant. His mind probably wont be in the right place. The sharks should play this weekends match with determination and passion out of respect, for their playmaker, makes me sad that someone has to play a game of rugby in such a time.
 
Very, very pleasantly surprised with our defense.
Had to hold my breath in most scrums for a while, but it looks like we've sorted that out. Fingers crossed.
 
Look, please, where is our FB on that try. Look where we were attacking and where he was.
 
saders
sharks
chiefs
reds
blues

Been thinking a lot about this round and our game. Think this wont be a popular opinion.
Stormers vs Jaguares, heart says Jags, but head says Stormers. Although what petite mentioned is true, it is also true that that statistic comes from a ridiculously high success rate in Australia/NZ and a mediocre one in south africa, and particularly bad against the Stormers. I think fixed formations will be key, and i see the stormers having an edge there. I see our attack being slightly better but their defence being considerably better.
One of the reasons our back 3 weren't exposed the last two seasons was because of the phenomenal job Orlando and de la Fuente (and occasionally Moroni) did on defense at the centre. They were always where they were supposed to be, they rushed their guy fast, hardly missed a tackle and got up and recovered very fast to support the back 3. That worked wonders the last 2 seasons and helped to cover holes in our defence. Well, that has not happened in 2020. I dare anyone here to show me a video of Boffelli making a try-saving tackle. Just one. He is a full back ffs.

Jaguares style with Quesada was nothing extraordinary. Cohesive defence, no silly mistakes, a lot of pressure, wait for the opponent to make a mistake, make him pay. Repeat. Get the fundamentals right, leave the fancy stuff for when we are 3 tries ahead. We copy-pasted the Lions' driving maul thingie, fixed a mayor scrum issue and then had a something strong to bring to the table.
But, look at the the first building block again: if our defence is not strong our entire style will collapse.

Jaguares' strengths and weaknesses are crystal clear if you look at our seasons: Offensively, our first two seasons were the best. Yet our defence was a disaster and we ended up not even qualifying.
Our last two seasons a ridiculous amount of our points came from forcing the opposition to commit errors as opposed to creating the chances ourselves (hope the difference is clear). That led us to the final. We need to tweak things here and there to adjust for the opposition and new players, but what works and what doesn't.
We were a team of few mistakes that transformed others' into points. Now the Reds scores us three tries in 30 minutes. At home.

My main concern before the season started was lacking the strength to break the advantage line that Matera and Lavanini brought to the table. That is not even in my top 3 concerns now.

I really, really wish i am wrong about half of this.
good analysis! I agree in most of it.
think also delguy is having a lower output. and without moyano our offence is deminished. I mentioned sclavi many times and today he made a statement against the strongest sr pack. and one od the best props in the world. hes massive 140 k and experece in the position makes the difference
it changed de scrum when replaced medrano. he still need to improve his game outside the scrum. but he did a good all around game., we can't improve as a team without if we can't get clean ball there. credit to bordoy.
 
Thought the Bulls were unlucky today. Didn't think the Odendaal incident was a penalty let alone a yellow card.

Any chance of Vermeulen returning after his stint in Japan?
They could also do with Michael Rhodes and Francois Steyn.
 
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I knew the Reds would be favored at home against my Sunwolves, but I never expected a 64-5 score. And I'm sure the Reds didn't either. That's the most points they ever scored in a game in their team's history.
 
Thought the Bulls were unlucky today. Didn't think the Odendaal incident was a penalty let alone a yellow card.

Any chance of Vermeulen returning after his stint in Japan?
They could also do with Michael Rhodes and Francois Steyn.

I thought the Bulls were extremely unlucky, and not just with that Burger Odendaal incident, but just overall with regards to the refereeing. I have to say I tend to agree with the Australian that made the remarks that SA referees are giving way too many yellow cards, and this match is prime example. 3 yellow cards in the first half alone. Seriously??? And all 3 of them were a bit of meh penalties in the first place.

My biggest frustration about this particular SA referee, is that it seems like he doesn't have control over the players, and then he gets angered by the remarks they make on the field, and then he takes it personally, and starts to target that team more with the player who made the remarks. You could see that he got annoyed with Andries Ferreira's constant barking.
 
Curwin Bosch missed the Hurricanes game because of the death of his mother, This week he is back in our starting team after flying to South Africa and back to NZ.
I dont want to speculate but it seems she must have passed away while he was away on tour (Cant confirm, just seems logical as he was in NZ for The Highlanders match)

Im not sure i want Bosch to play for us this weekend, yea we dont have another backup flyhalf on tour after Boeta got concussed but family should come first now for him, rugby is irrelevant. His mind probably wont be in the right place. The sharks should play this weekends match with determination and passion out of respect, for their playmaker, makes me sad that someone has to play a game of rugby in such a time.
Can confirm now, https://www.sport24.co.za/Rugby/SuperRugby/butch-brilliant-bosch-must-put-his-hand-up-20200220

So this article above was posted on Sport 24.

Then the sport 24 editor seems like he does not actually do his first job which is actually editing the work of his journalists. I say this because he has posted this article
https://www.sport24.co.za/Rugby/SuperRugby/mapimpi-was-that-selfless-or-a-little-silly-20200224

In essence he is saying Mapimpi who gave up his hatrick to give the Ball for Bosch to score was silly and warants a talking to from his coach. He then asks if it was really worth it to give him the ball just because it was his 50th appearance.

My dude did you not read your own Journalists article? Mapimpi did not give the try to Bosch because it was his 50th game it was out of respect for Bosch playing so soon in such a difficult time for him after his family loss. Unless obviously the Journalist is way off the mark, in which case the editor still needs to take a form of responsibility as he needs to fact check content posted under his section. Either they are misinformed or the pundits and journalists are currently just taking the ****.
 

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