Edinburgh V Northampton - final pre season game

15 Tom Brown

14 Mike Penn
13 Greig Tonks
12 Ben Atiga/John Houston
11 Sep Visser

10 Gregor Hunter
9 Richie Rees

1 John Yapp
2 Andy Titterrell
3 Willem Nel
4 Perry Parker
5 Steven Turnbull
6 Dimitri Basilaia
7 Roddy Grant CAPTAIN
8 Netani Talei

Substitutes:
16 Alun Walker
17 Robin Hislop
18 Lewis Niven
19 Sean Cox
20 Robert McAlpine
21 Hamish Watson
22 Chris Leck
23 John Houston
24 Jamie Farndale
25 Dougie Fife
26 James King

15 Ben FODEN
14 Vasily ARTEMYEV
13 George PISI
12 Dom WALDOUCK
11 Ken PISI
10 Ryan LAMB
9 Lee DICKSON
1 Soane TONGA'UIHA
2 Dylan HARTLEY (capt)
3 Brian MUJATI
4 Samu MANOA
5 Christian DAY
6 Phil DOWSON
7 Tom WOOD
8 GJ VAN VELZE

Replacements
Mike HAYWOOD, Alex WALLER, Paul DORAN JONES, Mark SORENSON, Teimana HARRISON, Martin ROBERTS, Stephen MYLER, Luther BURRELL, Ross MCMILLAN, Rhys OAKLEY, James WILSON

Have to say think this is going to be a tough one from Edinburgh. That is pretty much the Saints' first team against very much a new 2nd team for us! Will be a good indicator of how we'll do when the internationalists are away though. My main concern is that our Scotland players' first games will be in the league itself!

Other minor concern is that only 2 forwards and 3 backs are Scottish....

What do Saints fans think of the game? 3rd game now so I expect you'll be flying.

Yep, with the teams selected, I suspect Edinburgh will get a tanking, especially up front.

only 5 scottish players? thats awful!

does look like a strong saints team and bench too. I expect the saints forwards to be strong again this season, the key to success for them will be how the replacements at 8 (wilson) and 12 (downey) go. downey was very much the go to man in midfield with the crash ball giving the forwards a target, waldouck is not that type of player, his partnership with the excellant pisi in the centres will be vital for the saints.

Very strong looking Saints squad. Could be an absolute rally. Great to see Wood get a start- hopefully puts in a big shift, and justifies his selection for the EPS. I like the Saints' centre partnership. Waldouck surprised me last week.

To be fair Edinburgh's pack is pretty beefy too, if not the same class as the Saints pack. Very physical front row, although I am as good a scrummager as John Yapp and I'm a winger. WP Nel is a rampaging beast and will want to put a marker down. Perry Parker is fairly raw but is a big lad - 6ft 8 and almost 19 stone. Very strong back row too with Talei being one of our best players last year.

So hopefully the pack can stand toe to toe with the Saints, but I do worry about the backs. Sep Visser and Mike Penn are pretty lightweight and hopefully Ben Atiga finally plays so we can see what he is like! If not then Houston is a solid but unspectacular player.

You know the Scottish way though - we always do well when we're underdogs!

This has the potential to be an absolute horsing; a brand new Edinburgh 2nd XV against what looks like the strongest team the Saints could field.

Both the Scottish pro teams look like going into the new season seriously under-cooked, with the decision not to play the majority of the Scotland players during pre - season. I suspect it will be a sluggish start for them both in the Rabo.

As for the Saints, the Waldouck - Pisi center pairing looks very dangerous, both great ball players.

I'm just not looking forward to Lewis Niven going up against TONGA'UIHA if he comes on! Gonna get eaten alive!

It wouldn't be pretty, especially if McAlpine comes on behind him! Hope Farndale gets on for some decent game time, a far better prospect than either Penn or Visser jnr.

Agreed. Yet to see Visser jnr do very much to convince me he is even half the player his brother is!

Neither have I, would much prefer to see his squad place go to James Fleming from the sevens squad. Paid his dues at both club and 7's level and deserves a shot. I suspect the 7's management don't want to loose one of their only players with genuine gas.

This could get pretty ugly. The gulf in class between the forwards is big. The gulf in class between the back isn't a gulf, it's an ocean.

I'm going to try and get along to this one. Reckon a couple of beers beforehand will be required to soften the blow. Can't see this being anything other than a mauling.

For me, Edinburgh will be undercooked going into the Munster game.

Right, off to Murrayfield, well the Roseburn actually. Couple of beers then see if this new credit card thingy works

Anyone know if Atiga is fit?

He's tweeted a picture from Murrayfield so can only assume so. Pitch is looking great.

RUGBY TIME!!!!!!!!!

What time is kick off?

Half 7

Thanks

Tickets ten quid

I can't wait for the Ulster-Saints double header in this years HC - its going to be epic with the respective packs.

Even their pre-match routine looks better than ours!

Am fearful!

5-3 to saints currently.

Tom wood try. Hunter pen.

Messy!

10 minutes into the second half and Edinburgh are 19-3 down...

24-3 down.

Several sloppy through the middle tries conceded.

Atiga not close to match fit.

52 minutes gone at Murrayfield and Saints are 26-3 up.
Pretty poor pre season from Edinburgh, yet to score a try

Lineout has been a major mess tonight. Scrum too, but expected that.

Saints get their 5th try, 33-3

Make that 40-3!

Good try from saints. Feeding on loose play from edinburgh.

One word - humping. I'm off!

7th try for saints? This is getting embarrassing

Final score at Murrayfield
Edinburgh 3 - 54 Saints

BANG!

That's the sound of me coming back down to earth.

Wow that was a total humping. The first half was bad, but we must have literally had less than 20% possession in the 2nd half.

Plus points (there are only a few)

The boys got a run around

John Yapp looked good - very aggressive around the park and better in the scrums than I thought he'd be.

Basalaia was having a barnstorming game before he had to go off injured. Combine him with Denton and Rennie and we're going to have the best ball carrying back row in the league

Gregor Hunter looks a good prospect at 10

Sepp Visser had the best game I'd seen him play for Edinburgh

Roddy Grant played well

Tom Brown was very solid at 15

Negatives (there are a lot!)

The lineout was a disaster

The scrums started well but ended up a disaster

Our defence in the 2nd half was a disaster

Ben Atiga was really not match fit

WP Nel was disappointing (early doors though)

We couldn't win any ball

We had so many basic errors and knock ons

Our kick chase defence was very poor

We were 2nd best at every facet of play. And we were lucky to come 2nd!

There was a great crowd of almost 3000 I reckon and there was literally nothing to cheer about. Absolutely zilch.

Really must do better or all last year's momentum will be lost.

Edinburgh clearly resting themselves for the HC !

The only plus I'd add to RDW's list is that Titterall was very busy in the first half, and made some good carries and tackles.

Biggest negative was the lineout. Complete and utter mess. No point giving up 3 pointers and kicking to the corner if you're just going to screw up the lineout.

Atiga tackled well and carried well, but was completely out of puff and knackered by the 50 minute mark. At one point leading up to Hartley's try he just stayed on the wing for about 5 or 6 phases catching his breath, and left Yapp and Titterall to defend his channel.

Perhaps the best news is the following:

1.Chunk 2.Ford 3.Cross 4.Gilchrist 5.Cox 6.Denton 7.Rennie 8.Talei 9.Laidlaw 10.Leonard 11.Visser 12.Scott 13.NDL 14.Jones 15.Brown

Only two of those guys played tonight, and Cox was out of position at 6. That was very much a second string, against a very strong Northampton, who have clearly had a more focused and purposeful pre-season than Edinburgh.

Agree that the crowd was good. Beer too expensive, but what can you expect!

At 3.70 that's cheap compared to the festival prices I've been paying this week!

Titerall did show up well in the loose, but my word he is tiny! Must be like 5ft 7 or something. He also must take a lo tof the blame for the awful lineout. I thought Alun Walker did well when he came on.

In a way I agree that everyone names above is yet to play really, but it means that 10 of that team hasn't had any pre season match action - got to hit the ground running!

I guess the start of the season will be a little bit of damage limitation, and hoping that the rest of the Rabo12 are also slightly undercooked.

Laidlaw was in the stand tonight doing the rounds. Although Hunter wasn't too bad tonight, the direction we get from Laidlaw was missed. All slightly simplistic in the backs.

Titterall is a small chap - bit of the Lee Mears about him. He certainly won't take the jersey off Ford, but he could be a lively impact sub when things get slightly turgid.

Here's to hoping Munster come ill-prepared.

Here's hoping we score a feckin try - not scored in both games! 3200 crowd - such a shame it was so crap.

Just seen the match report: they should just have printed this and saved column inches.

Edinburgh guys getting worried? Thought Backy was meant to add some steel? Nevermind, 1872 Cup staying in the west then!

You guys haven't exactly done great either....!

Talking about which aspects of Scottish rugby are least awful?

Ah...., it takes me back to those halycon Matt Williams days.

I'm not pressing the panic button yet - it is very early days - but if we're still like this after 10 games then we really are screwed!

Did your scrum improve.much from playing us

Started off ok and we held our own but as the game went on we were put under a lot of pressure - especially when our reserve front grow of young guys came on. Not surprised though considering the quality of the saints pack - they'll be doing that to a lot of teams this year.

Aw yeah defo they've got some pack. How did wood play for saints. I noticed he scored.

Didn't do anything stand out but since we got dominated up front you can assume he played well!

Aye...

The real standout player on the pitch was Pisi at centre. Some lovely touches. Despite the scoreline the first up tackling from Edinburgh wasn't too bad, but the offloads, stepping and recycling speed from the Saints was just too much.

The Edinburgh scrum was as expected. It struggled without capitulating. The lineout was far worse. Utterly dreadful.

Thankfully the Miunster game is on Saturday night, so I can drink sufficient amounts to forget what happened....

Who was the ginormous centre that came on for saints? He was a total beast!

Munster lost to London Irish at the weekend, so they haven't had a fantastic pre season either

sometimes being out of the country in an area with no rugby coverage is a blessing. Sounds like an absolute horror show.

RDW - think it may have been Luther Burrell coming on. Good cameo and came on at the right time, once Northampton were cruising.

Radge - you missed a shocker. Not sure we even created a line break.

Let me know if anyone fancies a pint pre-Munster on Saturday. We'll need it!

Did we even touch the ball in the 2nd half? I was genuinely considering leaving with over 15 mins to go.

Edinburgh website seems to suggest the entire squad is now available for selection. Wonder who he'll pick?