The Ospreys will play the first of two pre-season friendlies against the Dragons and then Cardiff a week later. The Dragons is away at Dave Parade and will be a real opportunity for this young Ospreys squad to put their hands up for a starting place when the URC season kicks off on October 21st.
By the time this game comes around, the Ospreys will have had several warm-up/mixed training games against Swansea University, the Dragons, Cardiff and Bath and we are all looking forward to the Mark Jones impact on our defence.
I had the pleasure of meeting Mark and seeing him in action recently during Ospreys Training and he looks a very accomplished coach. You could really see the players buying into his ideas. We could even see two different XVs for each half.
I think this first proper pre-season friendly could probably see a squad of around 30 players selected...
Forwards from - G Phillips E Fackrell S Parry E Lewis T Botha R Henry R Davies H Sutton J Regan J Fender W Griffiths J Tipuric M Morris M Morse W Hickey H Deaves J Ratti
Backs from RMW L Davies O Williams D Edwards J Walsh K Giles A Cuthbert L Morgan M Nagy M Protheroe I Hopkins K Williams O Watkin D Morris
For those who did not go (and the crowd was not a big one and the announced crowd of over 4k must have needed somebody with double vision to have done the counting) here are my thoughts.
First half team Walsh Protheroe Watkin Williams Giles Edwards Davies Phillips Lewis Warren Sutton Davies Ratti Morris Deaves. Pretty much controlled possession and territory but two huge defensive blunders cost 14 points. Protheroe just panicked and just passed to the Dragons winger on their 22 line when there was nothing on and he went the length of the field. I think it may have been Morris and Ratti who collided in our 22 and let a runner through for the second. The half back play was not great and their kicking very average but the real problem was the line out. I lost count of the number of over and under throws. When we won line out ball it was not very well controlled and we must have missed the jumper as many times as we hit him which when we were turning down kickable penalties made the position worse. Walsh managed a lovely try after a really good outside break by Watkin. Should have levelled with a close in line out but another line out throw went astray.
Second half Morgan replaced Giles and Henry came on a loosehead for Phillips. Scrum struggled and we were just throwing front ball to Ratti which was inevitably slow ball and game became more even before we started making mass subs around 50 minutes. Dragons went out to 17-7 with a penalty. The subs were Walsh to 10 Nagy to 15. Morris and Scullly to the centres. RMW to 9. LLoyd for Lewis Botha for Warren Fender for Davies and Morse for Morris. Got it back to 17-14 with a well worked try for Nagy but at that point lost Deaves to injury and Lewis Jones came on and Sutton went to back row. i heard Fricker replaced Protheroe but did not see the change happen. The Dragons got another penalty to go 20-14. LLoyd improved the throwing and he did well to get over after a maul but Walsh made a hash of the clutch touchline conversion kick leaving it at 20-19. We had some chances to win it with a couple of long range break outs initiated by RMW and Morse but Scully did not have the legs to finish it off. Game ended when Lloyd bodged the final line out throw which was quite fitting in the context of what cost us the game.
The two subs who stood out were Morse and Fender. Morse was winning collisions all over the place. RMW was a clear upgrade on Davies who was disappointing. The scrum struggled with Henry and Warren but when Botha came on it gained ascendancy. Neither Edwards or Walsh has the poise of Owen Williams but I think Walsh is going to be better for us at 15 than 10. Our defence looked comfortable other than the the one instance where two players collided. Our attack had the same problem of struggling to get quick ball. The attacking breakdown is a huge problem as we dont clean out well and have very little attacking width so the opposition seem to get more numbers there than us. I think we will sort the line out because there was nothing wrong with Lewis mechanics just slight but crucial inaccuracies. The attacking breakdown I am more worried about and we desperately need one of the coaching team to take charge of our sequencing because sometimes it looks as if the opposition have more idea where we are going next than we do.