Scarlets v Dragons, 25th November 2011

First topic message reminder :

The teams have been announced:

Scarlets: Daniel Evans; Nick Reynolds, Adam Warren, Gareth Maule, Sean Lamont; Stephen Jones (capt), Gareth Davies; Phil John, Ken Owens, Rhys Thomas, Sione Timani, Damian Welch, Aaron Shingler, Johnathan Edwards, Ben Morgan.

Replacements: Emyr Phillips, Iestyn Thomas, Deacon Manu, Lou Reed, Mat Gilbert, Rhodri Williams, Dan Newton, Viliami Iongi.

NG Dragons: Martyn Thomas, Tonderai Chavhanga, Adam Hughes, Ashley Smith (capt), Aled Brew, Jason Tovey, Wayne Evans, Phil Price, Rhys Buckley, Dan Way, Adam Jones, Rob Sidoli, Andrew Coombs, Gavin Thomas, Tom Brown.

Replacements: Steve Jones, Nathan Williams, Nathan Buck, Scott Morgan, Jevon Groves, Joe Bedford, Lewis Robling, Steffan Jones.

It's a great shame that a Welsh derby has been deprived of so many Welsh internationals by a meaningless money-spinner at the Millennium Stadium, but here's hoping it'll be a great match all the same.

Link to game:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_union/default.stm

Awful decision from the Dragons - They should have taken 3pts to go in level at half time. Instead they inspire a counter-attack and go in 10pts behind.

Ref is doing well, haven't seen him before.

Llanelli got this one won you would have to say as Newport look poor

Jimmy Moz wrote:Llanelli got this one won you would have to say as Newport look poor

There organisation is appalling.

Dragons have lost their 6 to injury - thats with Lydiate and Lewis Evans with Wales aswell.

Good game from Brew, but you have to give credit to the character of Stephen (300 games) Jones who with a 100% kicking display highlighted to Tovey(who was quite poor) that when you are not picked for the Welsh setup .............. you just pressurise the Welsh coach to keep you in mind with a great performance

Brew and Chavy played really well for the Dragons, as did S Jones for the Scarlets but it was a poor game with too many mistakes and not very good tactics - which is a shame.

PS what happened to McCusker?

Poor game. Typical dragons. A game that could have been won and we're littered with mistakes. Brew was our only real success.
On Tovey. I don't think biggar is a top player, but I wouldn't have Jason in the welsh squad. He doesn't want to know defensively. He drifts in and out. No doubt he gas talent. I'd like to see steffan get a run in the team and give Tovey a kick up the arse.

Agree with you MOG. There were calls for Tovey to be in the welsh squad a few seasons back but I disagreed then and I do now. There are a number of better options at the moment and he does blow hot and cold even within the same game.

A bit of a poor game from both sides tonight. Well done Scarlets on the win but it was a really scrappy encounter. Typical away from home play from us: 'plucky' but no substance. Our back line was mainly static. The number of times players took the ball stood still was pretty much every move. As Jiffy pointed out we even had dummy runners ahead of the distributor! That was fooling no one!

Overall a scrappy game that we managed to compete in to a certain extent, and even had chances to score tries and potentially win, yet we were poor in our execution.

Ah well, hope we do better at RP.

Smirnoffpriest wrote:Brew and Chavy played really well for the Dragons, as did S Jones for the Scarlets but it was a poor game with too many mistakes and not very good tactics - which is a shame.

I thought Chavanga had a shocker - made a load of mistakes, Jiffy was picking up on it on commentary and he almost applauded when Chavanga got the ball and didn't mess up for the first time.

Jimmy Moz wrote:Llanelli got this one won you would have to say as Newport look poor

I would have to say you are pretty childish for constantly referring to Scarlets and Dragons as that and I don't see why you feel the need to stir things up. All you done on this thread is try to disrupt it.

Didn't see the game, but I had a feeling we'd lose down there. Pretty disappointed to read the reports about Tovey, but delighted that Brew played so well apparently. Wasn't too chuffed that Stinky scored against us either, as I'm not a massive fan of his.

Again, with regards to the grounds, I really don't think any other ground is really suitable for hosting any Dragons game. The facilities at Bedwas, Keys, Ebbw Vale and Pontypool are not up there sorry, especially compared to those at Rodney Parade (hospitality, parking etc).

Anyway, congratulations Scarlets.

Risca Rev wrote:I would have to say you are pretty childish for constantly referring to Scarlets and Dragons as that and I don't see why you feel the need to stir things up. All you done on this thread is try to disrupt it.

I always refere to them as that and have done since the fake regions came in. You will get used to it and its hardly disrupting if you dont like it just ignore it

Jimmy Moz wrote:

Risca Rev wrote:I would have to say you are pretty childish for constantly referring to Scarlets and Dragons as that and I don't see why you feel the need to stir things up. All you done on this thread is try to disrupt it.

I always refere to them as that and have done since the fake regions came in. You will get used to it and its hardly disrupting if you dont like it just ignore it

As Risca says it's very childish - as the name clearly says Scarlets and Newport Gwent Dragons the nicknames are Scarlets and Dragons or you could even call them the Cochyn a'r Dregiau.

All you're doing is very chilishly calling them the names of clubs that are playing today in a different competition as you know it will annoy people.

ah just ignore him lads, he's only getting what he wants by us responding to him.

With regards to the game, well, twas just a bit awful.

It was a free for all at the breakdown, resulting in neither side getting clean ball to run through their backs. Ref has a bit of a 'mare in that regard, wasn't impressed with him at all to be honest. Guess from a Scarlets pov the one thing we did was get points nearly every chance we had which is pleasing.
Stevo had a stormer as well. Can easily say if he hadn't been playing we'd have lost. He led us superbly, so diolch Stephen for not playing for the Baabaa's today, and choosing to stay with us. A true Scarlet!

Chavanga needs to learn how to kick a ball properly, he sliced a couple of shockers out on the wing. Got scary speed on him, but he's still so raw, will be interesting to see how he develops.

Adam Jones and Brew were good again for Dragons, and I Iongi, Scarlets new winger, looks super fast I've got to say, and he almost scored on his debut! (twas the phase before RHys T scored I believe).

SO yeah disappointing game, Dragons unlucky not go et a LBP, but am happy with the win.

Agree with everything you say rugbydreamer - the only reason I thought Chavy had a good game was because everytime he and Brew had the ball they looked so much more dangerous than any other Dragon.

Nige was pretty scathing about the way the breakdown was reffed - basically saying you may as well not ref it and have open warfare if you're going to ref like that.

Steve really did control the game for us, and I noticed him pulling fowards out of the ruck area in the 1st half when we were swamping that area and still not getting quick ball.

Nige is spot on Priest. It really was a free for all out there, and on the terracing we couldn't make head nor tails of some of the reffing decisions. Just completely baffling. It's annoying because this could have been such a great game, and both teams did try and make a go of it, but when posession is being disrupted so much, tis really blydi difficult.

Stevo was on fire. Every time we drove the Dragons back in a tackle, Stevo was at the heart of it. Every kick chase he was nearly always leading it. Just, yeah had his best game for a long, long time, looked really fired up for it. Twas great to see

Congratulations to Wellies on his 300th game and to Scarlets for the win. Thought this was a poor game of rugby though in what should have been a good running game. Sometimes I guess the Welsh derbies be come attritional matches with both teams cancelling each other out.

If I was a rich man I would pay for our entire back line to go to the NZ to learn how to attack and run proper support lines and dummy runs because the Dragons going forward tonight were very poor. There wasn't anything in this game and we had a number of chances to score a try. I think it's obvious already that we will be in the Amlin Cup next year also. I don't see us getting above any Welsh region now by only winning our home games as this is all we seem to be able to do at the moment.

Have to say, Turkville has to be one of the most unfriendly and unwelcoming away trips in the Robocop. Are you all a bunch of miserable, moaning gits or was it just the inbreds I was stood by?

eh? that's a bit of a random post RF. All the Dragons fans I saw there yesterday were all hugely welcomed and appeared to be having a great time.

If you were on the terracing and are on about the moaning of the ref; then aye there was a lot of that, but I think both sets of fans were annoyed with the officiating.

Two teams who were disrupted by WRU descision to play an extra international game against Australia. Just think how much better this game would have been for the paying supporters on both sides if the 7 scarlets and 4 Dragons, currently with Wales were playing for their regions last night instead.

I also agree that the Ref was poor, the players could not understand his descisions at the breakdown and scrum. I couldn't understand why when the Dragons were going backwards at a rate of knots and their scrum disintegrating why the Scarlets were being penalised?

I was hamstrung while watching the game by my inlaws coming round and talking all the way through the game and my step-father trying to look knowledgable but getting Rugby Union and Rugby League mixed up. So I always thought it was just me who didn't have a clue what was going on at the breakdown as I wasn't pay enough attention - but turns out everyone was in the same boat lol.

One thing that the ref didn't affect (unless I missed something else) and is a big concern was how awful our (Scarlets) lineout was

ah seagultaf! that I found baffling. There was one decision, where we were still driving straight, the Dragons scrum disintegrated and the then blew up, said we'd gone through 90 and gave the penalty to the Dragons

Now I don't understand everything about the scrum, but that didn't seem right to me.

And you're right, the game could have been a brilliant one, had both sides had all their best players. The WRU should be doing all it can to help boost crowds at the regions, instead of scheduling a farcical game, meaning the regions are without their stars. Crowd numbers are bound to suffer for it.

ah Priest, I was trying to forget the lineout!

It was back to the shambles it was a couple of seasons ago. I seriously hope it's a blip. Ulster and Munster will punish is big time if we play against them with it fireing so badly again. It looked to me like we only managed to win one.

Yeah I was on the terrace, and I really wish I hadn't bothered and got a ticket in the stands with the rest of them.
Every Drags line out not straight, every Drags player offside all of the time and if I had to hear ''absolute rubbish'' one more time from that bloody bloke up from me I was going to go hang myself in the toilets. I even heard calls for Brew to be carded for his ''shoulder barge'' when he destroyed Shingler with the ball in hand!
Never heard moaning and whining like it in a ground anywhere.

I hear stuff like that in lots of ground RF86 - especially down the Dave

ah yeah RF but you get that everywhere, I heard loads of it when I was at Dave Parade last season. And to be fair the Dragons were always offside, tis just that a lot of Scarlets fans chose to ignore the fact that we were offside continuously too!

THink it was just one of those nights. THe game's not flowing, no one agrees with the ref, and it was just a bit of an uninspired performance = moaning will follow!

Maybe I was just stood with the wrong crowd, last season was great.

where abouts were you stood?

I will say there was a lot more moaning then there usually is, but as I've already said, think it was just one of those nights. We couldn't get much singing going or anything.

Between halfway and the ten metre line, had a couple of moany old women behind me who I did tell to shut up and enjoy the game at one point

ah no worries. I was in the same area, but to the right of the half way line as you face it (I'm assuming you were to the left?)

Besides, we're good at moaning out west

I think one of the best bits was when we were absolutely outraged that no one was yellow carded when Welch was pulled out of the line out, yet when Gilbert did that against Saints last week, no one saw fit to comment on it, funny that....

Yeah that's it isn't it, we're all the same though. The amount of calls I heard for cards, even one when we were crossing! All I heard was muttering after that tackle, which to be fair i didnt think was a card but could have been 50/50. I half jokingly said come on ref at least a yellow and someone turned around and called me a nobhead!

ah oh dear! emotions always run high during a game. Twas all happy faces and banter in the barn afterwards though, think you must have just been unlucky where you were stood mate. You get bad eggs at all grounds sadly.

Very true and yep probably just unlucky.

Rucking, have to say as a Dragons fan and Dave Parade regular for over 10 years that we're not shy of a one eyed comment ourselves! In fact, I stand on the 10 metre line in the Hazell terrace (changing room half of the pitch) and there's some real b*ll ends near us. There's a father and son combo who scream at any decision, good or bad, and I fear for the old man's heart. Also, there's some weird screaming women who spits so much fire and venom that I fear she'll explode! Seriously, I'm genuinely embarrassed for her and her family!

We all have them, but sounds like you managed to find theirs the other night Rucking.

Griff I've been going over Dave for around the same amount of time and I've never really heard any big time moaners, not even all those years in the Argus, but then it depends where you stand really and I guess I've always been lucky. Even our own home fans would annoy me if I had to stand through 80 mins of that much moaning and complaining.
It wasn't just the moaning to be honest, it was the attitude. People giving us utterly disgusting looks every time the Dragons were awarded a pen, like we were somehow personally responsible. I had some woman sat up in the stand behind me aswell who kept on leaning over and sneering at me until I told her to shut up.
Seems like something and nothing but at RP I do always try to go out of my way to speak to away fans and share a chat with them so I guess I just found the PYS welcome a bit suprising this time.

I wasn't going to get involved in this discussion, but just to say last year in the corresponding fixture there were some Dragon fans behind us mouthing off and shouting, swearing the whole game through, seems you get those at every game, these particular ones were in a hospitality suite, so they'd obviously paid extra to get a good view and access to a bar as well, yes I do sit in the South stand, glad to say we won that game and they seemed extra peed off when we were laughing at them, if you'd been watching the game on tv you may have heard them towards the end suddenly switch allegiance and chant for the Ospreys instead, but hey ho, I enjoyed the result even if they tried to spoil the day.

This season when the Scarlets played the Blues in the LV Cup there was a vocal group of Scarlets fans making it sound more like a home Scarlets game and this miserable old woman Blues fan kept turning round and swearing at the Scarlets fans and telling us to F Off. (Fair enough they were loosing 33-0 and had tonnes of kids out)

You get it everywhere

You do get it everywhere absolutely just seeing as I've had some good laughs down on the terrace in PYS in the last few seasons this time was just a surprise and that's all. I looked to my right and saw the Scarlets lot we were stood with last season and wished we'd gone down there.