Edinburgh Rugby Supporters Club

[miss-tink]

That was more like it!

Was a bit nervous about Southwell being played at centre for the first time in ages but he did ok apart from a couple of wobbles..which is pretty much on par for him lately but a vast improvement on the previous weeks performance.

Hopefully we can take a boost from this win and take it on the road to Newport

[jrp]

[djphilp]

[Jon]

"then too".... when are these defensive nightmares you refer to djphilp? Yes sometimes he cannot stop a player running full pelt at him, but he always tries. Most (if not all) players will get run over, through or stepped past at some stage. Mossy is not a poor defender, and he does not miss lots of tackles, honestly get a grip.

[djphilp]

[Eildon]

Very often, it is the case, as John Beattie recently said, that CP's problem is that he is expected to do too much on his own, and lacks support from colleagues. If you look again at the Leonelli try, for instance, you will see three Scots players all lined up watching the action, with one, Parka, near enough to touch Leonelli, yet CP was left to try to turn Leonelli on his own. In the Calcutta Cup 2005, Jamie Noon had already run through a selection of Scottish players before reaching CP. He slipped and fell against Chris, knocking him on to the back foot and therefore unable to tackle properly. Etc. CP isn't perfect - who is? - but why single him out when so many of his colleagues could be similarly targeted?

I also seem to remember that in 2005 CP was Rugby World magazine and the BBC's Fullback of the Six Nations - and that the SRU used him as the "How to tackle" model for the training DVD they issued to schools.

[djphilp]

[Debaser]

Without trying to reignite the Mossy fanclub defensive response... Brian O'D did pick him against leinster and run with him for 10 yards. While this is not questioning his defence it does highlight the difficulty he has being 2-3 stones lighter than the opposition backs. I don't question his commitment but I do question whether he is the best person to form the last line of defence when the attacker needs smashed into touch? I suppose that brings in the question of whether rugby is still for all shapes and sizes.

I would suggest that he recieves a larger amount of critisised due to being Scotland's highest profile back. Having said that he was superb last week and he'd be my pick for full back.

[Crichton Gunner]

In reality, how often is the full back making a one-on-one tackle with a big bruiser close to his own line, where if he gets run-over then it's a try? Not very often. In most cases where the full back is one-on-one as the last line of defence it's further up the pitch, and if he can get hold of the attacker and at least slow him down it gives time for the rest of the defence to catch up and sort out the problem. Mossy is well able to do this, he is a brave and good technical tackler. Yes, he'd probably not stop Xavier Rush from 3m out, but then again not many of our squad would (as has been demonstrated in the past).

[Oldsalt]

This is history now, let's move on to the Dragons match.

[Crichton Gunner]

OK, as long as I can post the same comment after that