November is some month for the Ospreys facing three of the four Irish sides and the two Italian sides all inside thirty days. The hits just keep on coming with the Ospreys going to Ireland to face the mighty Munster next Sunday on the back of two loses against Zebre and Leinster. Whilst the performance and result was not so good against Zebre, there certainly were promising signs against Leinster and I expect those to continue next Sunday. I would like to see the following matchday Squad
R Jones S Otten M Fia BBBD A Beard D Lydiate D Lake G Evans (but Lake will probably start at 2 with Griffiths at 6)
S Venter S Myler H Dirksen K Williams J Hawkins M Protheroe C Evans
Reps
G Thomas I Phillips T Botha R Davies W Griffiths R Morgan-Williams J Thomas C Carson
If and when we can select from a full squad I believe we are two players short of making a very competitive team. We need a more athletic second row to compete at line outs and an aggressive ball carrying number eight to get over the gain line.
OST Match Report - https://www.ospreyssupporterstrust.co.uk/post/munster-v-ospreys-match-report
This season will allow Richie Pugh and Duncan Jones the opportunities to show what they can do as coaches. Also if we can get to a point in the next 2 seasons where we can compete up front, the sheer pace of Morgan and protheroe seem to be really dangerous. Also thought that Rhys Davies went well and dewi lake was good too following such poor performances at line out recently. As an aside, I though Paul o’connells punditry was quite lazy in his appraisal of us. He seemed to be surprised we were struggling, almost as if he was unaware of what happened last season.
We don’t have players to dominate the gain line, we appear weak at many clear outs and why we only have one open side in our squad is bewildering, certainly as he’ll be away with wales for most of the remainder of his career. Too many silly mistakes like telegraphed charge downs and kicking out on the full whilst not under pressure made it look like for a large part of the game it was men vs boys. However, although the commentators suggested Munster took their foot off the gas we showed we were capable of fighting even when down by a cricket score. We got 2 tries by beating Munster up front...something that rarely happens out there, but conversely it would appear today we had an inability to stop their rolling mauls (apart from at the very end). Some green shoots to be happy about, but watching today was made all the harder by not picking up 4 points in zebre, which although booth said was ancient history...it still stings.
Munster barely had to do anything for their tries.
Our mistakes are killing us.
Some quick thoughts....
Decent all around effort
Too many silly penalties given away
Points conceded off our own mistakes
Protheroe excellent at the counter attack
Attack not very sharp
Which young players are being inhibited? I think a better explanation is that they aren’t good enough for the level of rugby.
I agree we have major problems with the squad I just don’t want the young players skills and ambition brought down a level to accommodate our shortcomings.
If you are happy to play a structured, boring style of rugby akin to Sumo crossed with NFL and chess we must agree to differ.I never said we were more talented what we lack is ambition to play a more attractive style. I watch a lot of age group and Premiership rugby and the players play a far more conservative style once with the Os.
Momentum is created by speed and not allowing the opposition defence to settle. We don’t have wait for a scrum half to arrive at a ruck , if the ball is playable the first man there can play it. We rarely offload or pass out of the tackle just crab across field our first instinct is to kick and give the ball back to the opposition to run back at us. If our aim is to get bums on seats after the Covid crisis we need to play a more exciting brand of rugby and stop the exodus of fans we have experienced over passed few seasons.
That’s because its coached out of them with too many static plays, we need momentum instead of pick and goes or should that be pick and falls.
I’m looking forward to seeing Prothero at fullback it could be very good with his pace.
We must stop giving away silly penalties and if plan A isn’t working try something else. Let’s be a bit more inventive we are not going to out muscle Munster. Watching Wales last night was like watching the Os plenty of huff and puff but no cutting edge, poor line outs and ill disciplin.
That Munster side is going to blow us away. Can‘t expect anything from this.
Munster team:-
Munster: Mike Haley; Darren Sweetnam, Rory Scannell, Damian de Allende, Matt Gallagher; JJ Hanrahan, Craig Casey; James Cronin, Kevin O’Byrne, Stephen Archer; Jean Kleyn, Fineen Wycherley; Jack O’Donoghue (C), Tommy O’Donnell, Gavin Coombes.
Replacements: Diarmuid Barron, Josh Wycherley, John Ryan, Billy Holland, Jack O’Sullivan, Nick McCarthy, Ben Healy, Dan Goggin.
Here is the Ospreys team
I think that Protheroe may in fact start at FB as Gaffer suggested.
any chance that parry will be back with us?
We can only hope.