Round 14

[saulan]

Sharks Edinburgh game is going to be a mess, basically playing in swamp conditions with the whole field basically a pool.

 

[unrated]

Sharks Edinburgh game is going to be a mess, basically playing in swamp conditions with the whole field basically a pool.

My advice as the coach would be to kick it at every chance. This needs to be ugly for us to win. Team who has possesion will knock. If a player wants to play and disobey orders then sub him for someone who kicks.

 

[mdaclarke]

How was Bosch ever a Bok?

 

[rN_X]

The worst thing you can ever do to yourself is be a Sharks fan.

 

[thejackal]

How was Bosch ever a Bok?

The missed kick to touch I can understand but missing the one in front of the posts was pretty bad. You would expect the territory and pressure to eventually turn into points here for the Sharks in the second half.

 

[mdaclarke]

The missed kick to touch I can understand but missing the one in front of the posts was pretty bad. You would expect the territory and pressure to eventually turn into points here for the Sharks in the second half.

It's 14 v 16 with Bosch on the field

 

[rN_X]

As long as Bosch and Everitt is at the Sharks, the Sharks will achieve nothing.

 

[thejackal]

It's 14 v 16 with Bosch on the field

He has had a nightmare. Brilliant there from Blair Kinghorn to finish that.

 

[unrated]

Yea this was a kicking game and our kicker was ****. But well done to Edinburgh to getting a win away from home, that takes some doing class side. Respect

 

[unrated]

Guess we are now the Stale Sharks

 

[rN_X]

Guess we are now the Stale Sharks
View attachment 13687

Should rather called us dead fish

 

[collace]

Just got round to watching the Ulster Stormers game. Baffled by the call at the end. Can anyone explain how it can be a scrum against Ulster when the ball did not go forward? If we go with the TMO call (which, BTW, I'm not going with at all) that the Stormers player hit the hand rather than the ball - the ball still travelled backwards.

I'm happy to be convinced otherwise but that's a try all day for me.

 

[Leonormous Boozer]

Desperately bad hit. Frawley can't catch a break.

14 man Connacht on top.

 

[Leonormous Boozer]

Took over a half of rugby but Ster clicking now. Funny how often the floodgates open once you score after a 14 man team were holding on desperately.

 

[TRF_stormer2010]

Sharks, well. Really underwhelming. Bosch had a mare but it really goes deeper than that.

Stormers got away with one. Home ground advantage really counts for too much in this competition from a refereeing giving the marginals every single time to the home team. Saw it in Europe and seeing it here. I'll tell you now if even our third best ref was on duty Ulster would've made good on the comeback. I'll take it though. Evens things out in my book even if not the ideal.

 

[Bruce_ma gooshvili]

I thought it was a clear knock on by Ulster at the end there, but yes, if the TMO had been Irish would he even of checked it?

Happy for Edinburgh as Kinghorn and Blair continue to develop. They stay on course for a home QF which should be the minimum they are aiming for.

Overall, nice to see full strength NH vs full strength SA produces competitive matches (outside of the 2 or 3 worst NH sides). Confirmation that the tournament should be fairly hotly contested despite the top 8 generally having an unfortunate gap over the bottom 8 this year.

 

[TRF_stormer2010]

I see the Ulster coach saying in his head they won that game. Good to see its not just our coaches that have a moan after things don't go their way. TBF that was never a try at the end. I can't imagine any game where a player losing control going over gets the try. Where I do feel for Ulster fans is the way it was handled though between a TMO with a clear agenda- IE leading the ref and a ref that doesn't sure of how to handle the situation. Shocking to say the least.

That and then a couple of small things, like for instance Senatla's high shot. Common sense says there was no malice but we've come to expect the penalty regardless and there were one or two other instances where he favored us in small ways. Stormers just need to learn to focus for 80. 14 points at the 8 minute mark and we stopped looking for attacking opportunities and started playing kick and defend because we are comfortable in defense but Ulster had the better kicking game and you can't try to defend a lead for 70+ minutes. There are mentality issues across the board with the SA sides.

I like the setup of the competition but Tappe Henning has his work cut out for him ensuring a better quality of refereeing. I was all but put off the entire thing with the way the referees favored home sides whilst we were traveling. Not sure what the solution would be. Going non-neutral referees would be something of a step backward even it might mean access to patently more competent referees. Possibly the URC could look at employing referees from outside the countries participating? Like getting in a Kiwi or English referee or two on an ad-hoc basis. I'm generalizing here but to me the Italian refs stand out as the poorest.

 

[WaterboySA]

Only watched highlights. Not taking the last mess into consideration, the Stormers did their best to lose. On the try.....I have no idea, was a mess, and I do not have enough knowledge of the rules to have an opinion.

 

[collace]

It was a try - Ulster should have beaten Stormers | SuperSport

It was a try. Simple as that. United Rugby Championship referee boss Tappe Henning explained it in simple terms regarding the controversial end to the DHL Stormers’ Vodacom URC win over Ulster.

supersport.com

Interesting. The head of URC refs came out and bluntly said it was a try and that there is "remedial" action underway with the TMO.

 

[TRF_stormer2010]

I can totally see how the situation was handled poorly but I can't see how one can call that a try. Orie hitting the player's hand still translates to that player losing control of the ball in the act of scoring surely. At least as far as I understand the rules or from what I have come to expect from seeing similar things happen in a rugby game and how it was handled on the pitch. Would be interesting to hear Hennings reasoning. Maybe Orie was offside?

Okay. After reading the piece I see Tappe is saying the process is wrong from a technical standpoint. I can get behind that. The TMO certainly was driving the process and volunteered the ruling as opposed to the referee taking charge. Still don't think in essence it is a try but certainly can't argue that the ref didn't call it a try and that the TMO overstepped his mandate from there on out.