George North in the centre

It might have been discussed, but what do people think of this? I've been thinking he was more of a 13 since I first saw him and I believe he played in the centre at grade rugby?

On one hand I'd like to see what a Roberts/North combination would do, but would feel harsh breaking up a developing partnership between Roberts and Davies, as well as losing a powerful runner on the wing.

In my humble opinion North and roberts are too much the same type of runner. Davies is fast and more creative in my thinking.

North is good on the wing, leave him there.

agreed. He may be good in the centre but a must win match is not the time to be experimenting. JD2 has been getting a lot of stick but he's been one of our best players. leave them both where they are

I had a dream last night, George North was a triplet and we had all three of them on the park against Namibia. Wing, 13 and 8!

Not prop?

Why would we need to replace Jenkins when he can score tries from half way bursting through and side stepping tackles?

But he is now going to play in the midfield. Didn't you see I said earlier he need to bulk up a little for midfield, he has the speed and the step, but a tad small in my opinion.

Who's George North?

don't know.

roddersm wrote:Who's George North?

biltongbek wrote:North is good on the wing, leave him there.

Quite right. He can still cause damage in midfield by coming in on the crash ball from the wing, and he'll be more effective as he'll have built up a head of steam.

My view is that Gatland was thinking out loud and not being entirely serious, but the press have taken him at his word.

Nope leave him where he is.

We are short of world class wingers so we need him to stick with being a winger. He has shown in games for the Scarlets that his handling isn't top notch just yet, but that is less important on the wing, you just have to catch it and run.

Anyway why would you leave out genuine centres like Scott Williams and JD2 to accommodate 2 players that are not natural centres i.e. Roberts and North, and neither of whom can offload very well.

He'd be a duck out of water, the guy likes it on the wing, let him be!

maybe centre is a better possition for him, he doesnt look comfortable under the high ball. however the welsh centre looks quite settled with jd2 and jimbob. the buisiness end of the world cup is not the time to tinker.

biltongbek wrote:Not prop?

I thought he was omnipresent, no? Surely, he can play in all positions at the same time!

North dummies to pass inside to North, grubbers through and North's over in the corner!

Ah, and it is called back, North was in front of the kicker.


Execution George, execution.

biltongbek wrote:Ah, and it is called back, North was in front of the kicker.


Execution George, execution.

That bluidy ref North, wants shootin, he was miles onside

Personally North being moved to the centre is not a bad idea. However to move him to the centre to partner Jamie Roberts just shows how little Gatland and Co understand back play.

Jon Davies and Scott Williams demonstarted (albeit against a weak side) the difference having an actual centre partnership (as opposed to individuals as we have with Roberts/Hook/Davies in any combination) can make. George North may well adapt overtime to become a Daf Jones type winger/centre however at the moment he is devistating on the wing, and very good at coming in looking for work, so why change that?

George north and Jamie roberts are both stirke runners, if you look at the two best center combination countrie then they have a "creator and strike runner"

nonu and smith
Barnes and AAC.

We ourselves are getting there with Frans Steyn and Jaque fourie.

Lethal I tell ye, lethal.

Leave him where he is for now and a few years at least.

We (Wales) more than nayone I think seem to have this annoying habit of playing players out of position rather than leaving them concentrate on one slot and becomming the best they can be it that slot.

are we in danger of building another Hook situation. we've heard it repeatedly Hook has to play somewhere. North is a fantastic player and in my fantasy rugby game i would love to see him at centre, but in hindsight another Hook situation could arise.

I think Gatland is developing an obsession with placing the biggest players he can find in the Welsh squad and playing them in centre! May as well go all out Gats and put the 6ft 9 19.5st monster that is Luke Charteris in the centre. Along with Gethin Jenkins of course...

gavstar wrote:are we in danger of building another Hook situation. we've heard it repeatedly Hook has to play somewhere. North is a fantastic player and in my fantasy rugby game i would love to see him at centre, but in hindsight another Hook situation could arise.

Its possibly also that Rugby is heading into the direction where no one is a position specialist anymore and seeing players who can play anywhere in the back line is becoming a lot more common, just look at players like Toevea, O'Connor, Beale, Cooper, AAC, Hook, Frans Steyn, and so on.

George is already in the Centre - Work it out - He's the centre of everything, possibly the centre of the Universe

Then what is he doing here, the centre of the universe is that way. and it is 17 million light years from here.

biltongbek wrote:Then what is he doing here, the centre of the universe is that way. and it is 17 million light years from here.

That just shows how fast the guy is then yeah

speed is not everything, at that speed his players won't even know he is there to take the pass.

biltongbek wrote:Then what is he doing here, the centre of the universe is that way. and it is 17 million light years from here.

Remember BB, its the omnipresence thing we talked about previously

Not a wise idea IMO to put Roberts and North in the centre, it would be a huge step backwards, Gatland said something along the lines of "Roberts and North in the centre.. not many would tackle that", well IMO the likes of Nonu, Smith, Sonny Bill, Fourie etc. would all know what was coming and would'nt have to much of a problem with it

it would be very predictable and one dimensional, neither have good distrubtion skills and the wingers would most probably be starved of the ball, North is doing well out on the wing at the moment, they can always bring him into midfield during a match if they want/need him to go crashing down the middle

maybe in the future they can give North a go in the centre but to do it now would just be tinkering for the sake of it as we have very good centres in Jamie, Jon and Scott at the moment who are all impressing

andy powells minder wrote:

biltongbek wrote:Then what is he doing here, the centre of the universe is that way. and it is 17 million light years from here.

Remember BB, its the omnipresence thing we talked about previously

you do realise if we are talking about omnipresence in spiritual form it is good.

When we talk about omnipresence in physical form it is called obesity.

biltongbek wrote:

andy powells minder wrote:

biltongbek wrote:Then what is he doing here, the centre of the universe is that way. and it is 17 million light years from here.

Remember BB, its the omnipresence thing we talked about previously

you do realise if we are talking about omnipresence in spiritual form it is good.

When we talk about omnipresence in physical form it is called obesity.

Shame on you, thats no way to talk about Steve "pieman" Thompson

North spent most of his time pre the Scarlets in the centre and despite his pace and size has very good distribution skills. He will almost certainly end up in the centre and that could happen sooner rather than later depending on the quality of wings that come through.

Actually, Roberts and North in the centre just for the Fiji game may be spot on , would be few people they couldnt tackle and they'd be hard to bring down themselves.

Might also stop wales throwing the ball about too much this time !

As Eclipse says Georgie was a centre until last year, as Christ College is my Almer Mater I saw him annihalate us for Llandovery College from centre. I do think that he will switch there eventually but not during teh world cup.

I think Gats knows we need to play a creative centre alongside a bulldozer, but for wales needs must at the moment. Scott williams is good but JR is flying and nailed on for 12. Had a certain Mr Henson not been such a complete flake this last year or so and had knuckled down with the O's at the start of the season our centre pairing would have had that balance. JD/JR aint too bad tho

munkian wrote:Actually, Roberts and North in the centre just for the Fiji game may be spot on , would be few people they couldnt tackle and they'd be hard to bring down themselves.

Might also stop wales throwing the ball about too much this time !

Two problems with that idea. The first would be that North is not actually that good defensively, so Jon Davies/Scott Williams in the centre would give us better tackling centres. And the other one would be that we would either have Brew on the wing (which would be suicide against Fiji, red card for sure), or we will feild probably two of the smallest wings in the RWC.

Isn't Gatland just mischief making? Isn't he really playing mind games with the Irish Defence Coach?

Two problems with that idea. The first would be that North is not actually that good defensively, so Jon Davies/Scott Williams in the centre would give us better tackling centres. And the other one would be that we would either have Brew on the wing (which would be suicide against Fiji, red card for sure), or we will feild probably two of the smallest wings in the RWC.

Suicide agasint Fiji ?

"North dummies to pass inside to North, grubbers through and North's over in the corner!"


It's like standing on the South Pole. Everywhere you look is North!

Mr Fishpaste wrote:"North dummies to pass inside to North, grubbers through and North's over in the corner!"


It's like standing on the South Pole. Everywhere you look is North!

that makes a lot of sense, now i understand what they meant with george north being omnipresent.

Mr fishpaste you have solved the secret of the universe.

Munkian - I like Brew as a player, however I think he has the same 'I am harder than you' attitude that we tend to think of the South Sea Islanders of having. So I would think that if Brew were to start on the wing he would be trying to bulldozer the opposition as opposed to trying to out play them.

can we stop trying to move all of our wingers away from their wings?

Halfpenny to Fullback (one im an advocate of)
North to Centre
Shane to fullback (that was me, and only me)*
Brew to 6 (covering Lydiate due to his intense tackling and rucking)*

we'll be playing bradley davies on the wing a la banahan before you know it as we'll have no wingers!

*please note these are no way endorsed by Warren Gatland.

Brew is big and strong, not quite as fast as George but the big difference at international level seems to be taht North looks for space to power through whilst Brew tries looks for contact a lot more.

The thing is for the dragons Brew is a different player he looks for space or to offload in contact and always looks dangerous. I dont think its down to gatts as Brew was the same under Jenkins.

However the look on his face as North scored his second said it all. He knew he had blown an oppurtunity despite his try.

TycroesOsprey wrote:Brew is big and strong, not quite as fast as George but the big difference at international level seems to be taht North looks for space to power through whilst Brew tries looks for contact a lot more.

The thing is for the dragons Brew is a different player he looks for space or to offload in contact and always looks dangerous. I dont think its down to gatts as Brew was the same under Jenkins.

However the look on his face as North scored his second said it all. He knew he had blown an oppurtunity despite his try.

I thought Brew was struggling after a big hit the way he came off, he seemded to look really groggy.

I don;t think he was that bad - he was always looking for work and trying to gain ground - I thinks it was unfortuante that the rest of the team took foot off gas in the 2nd part of the 1st half - he had very little to work with.

why fix whats working? jd and JR are just starting to play well together- JR being immense so far and JD playing very well against nambia, why? north is devastating off his wing and like all good wingers he comes in to look for work. i think its gatland playing his usual tricks atm, next maybe Powell at 10 as his distribution skills were good against nambia, AND NOT MUCH WOULD STOP THAT!!!

biltongbek wrote:George north and Jamie roberts are both stirke runners, if you look at the two best center combination countrie then they have a "creator and strike runner"

nonu and smith
Barnes and AAC.

We ourselves are getting there with Frans Steyn and Jaque fourie.

Lethal I tell ye, lethal.

Talk about fickle...the other bloke whp paired with Fourie qucikly forgotten!

Comfort wrote:can we stop trying to move all of our wingers away from their wings?

Halfpenny to Fullback (one im an advocate of)
North to Centre
Shane to fullback (that was me, and only me)*
Brew to 6 (covering Lydiate due to his intense tackling and rucking)*

we'll be playing bradley davies on the wing a la banahan before you know it as we'll have no wingers!

*please note these are no way endorsed by Warren Gatland.

MEMO TO ALL PLAYERS

Just so you know I am playing on one wing v Fiji and Gethin is on the other.

Cheers

Warren

Gatts wrote:

biltongbek wrote:George north and Jamie roberts are both stirke runners, if you look at the two best center combination countrie then they have a "creator and strike runner"

nonu and smith
Barnes and AAC.

We ourselves are getting there with Frans Steyn and Jaque fourie.

Lethal I tell ye, lethal.

Talk about fickle...the other bloke whp paired with Fourie qucikly forgotten!

Sorry mate you are wrong I have been criticising De Villiers` lack of creativity for the last three months or so.

Two things. First, the WC is NOT the time to tinker. North has started 100% of his pro rugby on the wing and has excelled, does 8 tries in 11 caps really cry out for change? Also agree with biltong, North and Roberts are much the same type of player and I for one don't believe the dogmatic bosh and bash solution in midfield is the answer. Roberts will do fine thank you.

Secondly, wouldn't shifting North to midfield be spitting in the faces of JD2 and Scott Williams who have had good showings at this tournament so far?

George who?