Selection, Selection, Selection?

Another week and another result to contemplate. A game that should have been buttoned up and finished 13 -24 with less than 5 minutes on the clock against a team that is known to ship 20+ points in the last 20 minutes. And remember, we were 10-0 down at 30 minutes!

Even down to 14 men that game should never have been lost despite all the talk of selection. The bench was loaded to take advantage of that last 20 weakness that Connacht seem to show. At the Q&A in Montpelier JA stated, categorically, he would have picked a stronger team if we had beaten Toulouse. Quite simply then, Europe was no longer on our radar; but with two losing BPs there seemed to be a change of heart with a strong team put out at home against Connacht. And that paid dividends with a BP win. Selection away to Connacht, with 9 changes, suggested that perhaps we weren’t going for it after all. The team dug deep, though, and seemed to deliver a result. It was all wrapped up with yet another BP win with less than 5 minutes remaining.

But once again our discipline let us down against what was a determined foe of youngsters strung together by injury who have proven themselves worthy adversaries. And once again handlng errors proved costly and once again the set piece suffered. Conceding twice as many penalties and losing 25% of your line out is always going to prove costly. Especially when you lose a key forward five minutes from time giving your opponents a penalty line out into the bargain.

Much of the talk has been about selection and about rotation policy and I have some sympathies with the view that a stable team helps build cohesion, something that has been identified as essential in elite teams. But when you looked at the starting 15 and the bench it’s difficult to find anyone that hasn’t earned their place. And L R-Z’s filthy off load still has me chuckling. So looking forward to seeing more from this kid. As usual lots of talk about Cips but he was missing and we have to cope with that. Ultimately we were looking at a BP win away from home with a lead of 11 points……so there was nothing wrong with selection.

And, hard though this might be for some to swallow, Poite was en-pointe (did you see what I did there ;-)).

So here’s where I see the problem lies. It’s not the players. Each and everyone has proven themselves at some point. Maybe not this season but certainly last season (I’m thinking 36 here). So we look elsewhere. It’s not selection. We were winning reasonably comfortably with less than 5 to go. It’s certainly not the guts and bravery of each and every one of the guys on the pitch meaning we have the most miserly defence in the league. And we also seem to have the ability to score tries from anywhere on the pitch.

It’s performance. It’s the tiny little things that take you from being champions to also rans. The tiny little things that mean Toulouse get 5 kickable penalties beating us in the 2nd half 16 – 0. The tiny little things that mean you’re captain is kicked off with 5 minutes to go when you’re defending on the line. The tiny nuances that mean the ball gets dropped instead of picked up. Where you knock on instead of hands on.  The Fine Margins.

And that is where we need to look to find the cause. What is going on and where, or who, is causing problems. What, or who, is not adding to team cohesion. Team performance. Because it is all about “The Team”, not just 23 players on game day.

Most of you know where I stand and I’m hearing rumours from multiple sources now. The drip drip is slowly becoming a stream that there is discontent and division. That is certainly enough to cause a well oiled machine to pick up a few bits of grit. Unfortunately it can prove costly to strip the engine down and get rid of that grit……especially when you consider how much certain individuals get paid and what sort of compensation may be demanded. But all the clues are there if you’re prepared to look……and see!