London Double Header

Im off to twickers today for the London double header and im really looking forward to it. There will off course be many inetrnationals missing from the line ups but its still important for the clubs to get a good start to the season.

1st game is Quins versus london Irish.
Irish started last season so well before falling away dramatically, a slight upturn saw them qualify for the HC but im not sure they're the same team as a couple of years ago. That team was the best attacking team in the prem but Irish have lost some key players in Stowers, Armitage, Mapasua and Sevi. They have also let Lamb go putting pressure on Bowden to perform at fly half. 2 of the big name replacements will not be available today (Hape and Ansbro) but young Alex Gray (Newcastle) does look a good signing. I dont think Irish are a top 4 side anymore.

Quins had a fantastic win in the challenge cup against Stade at the end of last season but will be looking for a better performance in the prem this year, more consistency and big game temperament. Not done too much business in the summer, just a few elder statesmen leaving and a couple of young props and 2 super 15 players coming in, i think they are backing last years squad to an extent. Quins have a young exciting lineup and i for one am hoping they will push on this year and gain a top 4 finish.

Quins will have too much for Irish today: Quins by more than 7

The second game is Saracens vs wasps

Immedialety this looks an easy game to call, saracens were a very strong outfit last year and i would certainly expect that to continue into this year. The players they have let go weren't key men last and they have brought in players like Smit (although he wont be available this today), hodgeson and Mako vunipola who all look like top signings to me. Saracens will be pushing for a second title and an improve HC performance too. Sarries are particulalrly strong up front, somewhere there opponents today struggled last year.

Wasps Have made lots of changes to the playing staff over the summer, something that was probably necessary as the club needed re-vitalising. They have brought more players in than they have let go and although they have made good decisions about which players to release, im not sure the players brought in are going to hit the ground running and produce instant results. They have improved options at fly half for this year should help but i think it could be another slow year for wasps with hopefully for them an improvement in the second half of the year.

Sarries by more than 10

Why have 5 Saracens penalties been taken by 5 different players?

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Lot's of guts shown by Wasps there, they are going to suffer through their scrum this season again though.

Launchbury looks more and more of an amazing prospect to me. It's scary to think that he is only 20 and is going to naturally bulk out further. That lad's got a long international career in front of him if he can stay fit and healthy.

Astute signings by Wasps all of whom did well together with the youngsters .
The scrum was shocking though & the props will need to be sorted out if we are to be looking at being serious play off contenders.

Well, one of the games didn't go the way of the OP's forecast.

I thought Wasps were looking at. 20+ points loss before k.o. Good defence, Nicky Robinson showing good composure, and nice to see the tries from the two wingers.

Sarries' limited game will not see them go far in the HC. Reminiscent of their showing against Leinster at Wembley last season; bereft of attacking nous.

Very happy with the result, and the best of luck to all as the season progresses

Great result for you Hound, Sarries were very disappointing, but full credit to Wasps for not allowing them to impose their game plan on proceedings.

As a London Irish fan, game 1 was very frustrating to watch. Despite being young there was so much talent in our backline but Adrian Jarvis at 10 had no clue of what to do with it. I pray that he is immediately 'rested' and Bowden moves to 10, with Shingler coming in at 12.

Sarries first half perfromance was extremely poor, there was no invention and I don't think Farrell passed the ball once. The legendary Sarries kick chase wasn't as sharp and the incisive back three for Wasps made them pay, had Wasps had a decent scrum then Sarries could have been further behind at the break. They were a bit better after the break when Goode came into the line more as they chased the game, Hodgson got the backs moving and Barritt looked twice the player in the second half when given the ball to run with.

Sarries did look a tad rusty and it showed with some silly mistakes and a lax pass from Goode when it looked a certain try. They will have to change things up if the want to get back to the top of the table. Wasps looked very good and Wentzel may be a contender for signing of the season.

Jonathan Poff and Joe Launchberry were the pick of our lot for me. And you could feel the buzz in the crowd whenever Wade got the ball with a bit of space. I agree that Wasps scrum was poor - Castex must start against Tigers next week.

And why did Sarries bother playing two wingers? They never tried to get the ball to them until they were chasing the game at the end.

I didn't see the LI v Quins game, but I met up with a couple of LI friends in the evening and they were very disappointed with the game.

Main disappointment was missed opportunities Hound. Ojo and Roche managed to butcher an overlap in the corner that should have been a try before half time and would have sent us in ahead.

Jarvis was also very poor and failed to play to our strengths. if we persist with him I can see us ending up in the relegation battle. If we get the selection right, I can see us troubling the top sides when we play them.

I'll be happy with top 6 and a decent showing in the Heino. The play off will be beyond us this season.

New as a poster on here, but been reading the posts for ages, keen to get involved now that the new season is underway (thank god! i was starting to have serious withdrawl symptoms and spending hours just watching clips on rugbydump).

On this though, Tim Payne was truly dreadful, I cannot see how he was in the England fold and I hope that Castex starts in front of him next weekend. We can't survive too many games with a scrum like that. He also can't seem to take a tackle without spilling the ball! Launchberry looks an exciting prospect though, so does Vunipola, such a shame that Rees is injured, otherwise it could be a fantastic backrow.

Looks like wasps are going to have to play a loose game style this season, we cannto afford to get bogged down into a mudslinging match otherwise we are going to get bullied. So happy that we managed to dictate how the game was played, we have some serious talent in the backline. Hugo Southwell is also a great buy, haven't had a reliable full back since Lewsey retired, its great that I can see a Gary Owen and not have my heart in my mouth!

Also thought that Wasps looked to have done their homework on Sarries, the rush defence just destroyed their pod system, Sarries looked like they had regressed back to England's tactics of 2003, they could struggle against defences like Wasps if they are repeated stopped behind the gameline.

I thought that the new signings all had great games, Dai Young seems to know what he is doing, hopefully this is a sign of things to come, the first couple of months are going to be crucial to us whilst other clubs have all their internationals away. Agree with Sam that Wentzel was an ingenious singing, nice to have at least one set piece which isn't a compelte liability!

Funny that Hodgson came on for Farrell, promptly missed a penalty, then a tackle for the match winning try!! Who said he can't defend...

Immensely disappointed with the Saracens performance.

The lineout in particular was very poor. Why?

The Saracens defence was simply not good enough. Hodgson or Strettle should have smashed Varndell.

Joubert butchered a try.

No gameplan. Clueless in attack.

Kick and chase was poor. Too many handling errors.

The only positive is that the team will get a bollocking and will hopefully up their game now.

One loss doesn't make a poor team so I expect them to bounce back.

One loss doesn't make a poor team so I expect them to bounce back..

Especially when the RWC is thiefing a good number of your players.

Was the line out poor or were the Wasps boys just more organised now that Wentzel has taken control? We saw at Tigers last season the massive difference between an experienced line out operator and a none line out specialist lock calling the line outs.

Not sure Hodgson can be to badly blamed for the try he was caught out by the pace of Varndell, Strettle however, was shrugged off far to easily.

Sam I will not use the RWC as an excuse. The team should be good enough to win without those players.

Maybe it's all relative. Saracens had the best lineout last season. Borthwick and Botha have no excuses for playing poorly. The lineout was nowhere near the high standards set by last season. Borthwick's job is basically just to make sure the lineout functions properly. He failed in that regard. Brits wasn't great either.

When the whole Saracens gameplan is built on strong set piece and defence, everything is bound to go wrong when they don't function properly.

Hodgson plays for Saracens now who have built their success on strong defence, he needs to make his tackles.

When you are supposedly the best you expect more from the players.

Expecting more and expecting what is attainable are different things. Wasps targeted the Sarries line out because though it is very good there is only one specialist jumper in it and as Kay pointed out in commentary he likes to use himself as a dummy option. Wasps came out with two line out forwards, one of whom is probabley the best defensive jumper in the league and they man marked Botha and Borthwick with additional cover from Launchbury. It made it very easy for them to attack the Sarries lineout and Wentzel's ability to take his own ball even under heavy pressure meant Wasps had a foundation.

Sarries attacking game plan was far to static and easily picked off by the Wasps rush defence (slightly concerns me as a Tigers fan as we're at their place next week) and with no imagination until Hodgson came on it was all to simple to pick off the runners. If Sarries are going to rely on a pod system to take the ball on they've got to hit the line at speed, allowing Wasps to charge their pod because they are static when receiving the ball is just asking for a turnover.

Sam I expect the same success.

You forget that Ernst Joubert is also a lineout jumper.

This was by no means a full strength Wasps team so I am very disappointed.

Quick word for Ugo Monye's finish, steamrolling over Tom Homer. Bit more aggression like that and Ugo will be back with England in no time.

I always felt that Monye had the physcial attributes but not the gray matter for top level rugby. A more physical Tom Varndell type. If he can get his mind focussed and really go for it then there is certainly an opportunity in the England squad.

Maybe it's all relative. Saracens had the best lineout last season. Borthwick and Botha have no excuses for playing poorly. The lineout was nowhere near the high standards set by last season. Borthwick's job is basically just to make sure the lineout functions properly. He failed in that regard. Brits wasn't great either.

Do you think that there was an element of rustiness about the Saracens line-out? I think I can remember 3 occasions where there was a miscommunication and the ball went to the wrong man completely, was a bit surprised as Sarries are the most organised team in the league by a country mile. Whilst I am waiting for news that Ben Kay is going to propose to Wentzel after his commentary, I think that Borthwick's hands were a bit suspect at times, I really thought he should have held onto a couple of those where Wentzel got up and in front of him but didn't get the ball. I think that it is something that should be sorted, Borthwick is a class line out operator and I cannot imagine that mistakes like that are going to become part of his repetoir.

Sarries attacking game plan was far to static and easily picked off by the Wasps rush defence (slightly concerns me as a Tigers fan as we're at their place next week)

I always await a Waps v Leicester game with an element of trepidation, I think that they are the best team at targetting a weakness in the NH and will see that the Wasps defence rushed up out wide and will play a tight game to suck in our defenders before heading there, something which I don't think Sarries really did at all, so the Wasps defence was set and got into their faces well behind the game line. Although I hope that I am wrong and send you running back to the midlands with tail firmly between legs!

Yes I do kedz but also Botha hasn't been the same since coming back from the England squad for whatever reason. I think I read somewhere possibly the unofficial Saracens forum that they changed lineout calls 2 weeks ago.

I presume you guys were watching the match on TV was there a forward pass in the first Wasps try in your opinion? I thought there was but obviously being at the game and being a Saracens fan makes it harder to give a fairer judgement.

Even if it was a forward pass or not I thought Wasps deserved the win.

I also think Wasps would have known a lot more about Saracens prospective gameplan,strategy etc than the other way round. Wasps have a new coach, many new players. Much harder to prepare against.

Wasps are essentially an unknown quantity which will make them difficult to prepare against initially in my opinion. It was like Exeter were like last season.

I suppose not training with his club squad for such a long period of time has had an affect, maybe they weren't as confident in throwing to him due to unfamiliarity and a worry that he might not know the calls etc. Looks like that rumour might have been true then! Some pretty awful hash ups in there!

I think that the ref must have thought that he was reffing the other code and applied the 'momentum rule' was close though.

But giving the ref the benefit of the doubt, and I thought he had a good game otherwise, he was quite far back from where it happened and had a few players between him and the ball, so couldnt really make a judgement on it.

Yep, nobody knows what we are going to come up with, sadly this means that I have no idea what to expect, just blind faith that we will come out on top! Having said that we have some good coaches and some very exciting talent coming through the ranks so I think that, provided we can provide a platform at the set piece, I think that we could do ok, that is quite a big 'provided' though considering our scrum. I almost cried when I saw that it was going to be the same as last year on that one.

Re Exeter, I'm sure Sam won't approve of that 'initially'....

Wasps are essentially an unknown quantity which will make them difficult to prepare against initially in my opinion

I don't know if they were difficult to prepare against because they were an unknown quantity I think it was that within the starting Sarries line up there was only a plan A. At no point did they mix it up from drive forward with pods and then kick the ball as into the opposition 22 and try to force a penalty. It was a complete waste of the considerable back division they had available to them. They looked a bit better in the second half but always seemed to be chasing the game and Wasps were able to defend well enough and rely on their pace to attack on the counter.

Re Exeter, I'm sure Sam won't approve of that 'initially'.....

The Pests are always likely to throw a spanner in the works. Tigers were also always up against it against Exeter, the Chiefs came with a pretty much full strength squad (via some new signings who had yet to play for them) we were missing about 20 players. Chiefs ran us close using a measured game based around a great set piece. We'd won both league encounters by staying focussed and using our experience to stay in touch and overhaul them late on. Most of our experienced first teamers are at the RWC and add to that we were missing large chunks of our pack. Fair play to the Chiefs they played very well but Tigers are going to need to do better next week otherwise an annoying insect is going to sting us.

It has been nice to take the crown off the Cat cats' heads over the past years I will admit, and hopefully after a couple of years floundering in mediocrity we will be flying high above them again

Do you guys have a load of injuries as well as the RWC players? Fairly sure you are only missing 11 (came up in a quiz the other night after I watched the Rugby Club, made sure our team only finished joint last..). Well we will not be beating you like that, because us relying on our set piece is close to suicide. Were they that good? Or was it more a case of you not showing up without your senior players? I have a lot of respect for Exeter for how they adapted to the Jeff, hope they can keep it up and avoid second season syndrome.

Do you guys have a load of injuries as well as the RWC players?

11 at the RWC, long term injuries for Crane, Newby, Parling, Omilio Campo (sp? I can never remember) and Pienaar with knocks ruling out Tait, Staunton, Kitchener and big Julian White having just had an operation on his knee. So we were missing 19 players ahead of the game vs Exeter, if you removed Woods from the bench then the rest only had about 20 Tigers starting appearences between them. We are down to the bare bones at the minute but with a bit of luck Tait, Staunton and Kichener should be returning for the Wasps game with Pienaar and Parling coming back a week or two after that and Farmer White back by October.