Toulon Blues

First topic message reminder :

Toulon: Delon Armitage, Rudi Wulf, Mathieu Bastareaud, Maxime Mermoz, Alexis Palisson, Jonny Wilkinson (capt), Frédéric Michalak, Chris Masoe, Steffon Armitage, Pierrick Gunther, Nick Kennedy, Jocelino Suta, Carl Hayman, Jean-Charles Orioli, Xavier Chiocci

Replacements: Sébastien Bruno, Florian Fresia, Simon Shaw. Davit Kubriashvili, Joe Van Niekerk, Matt Giteau, David Smith, Nicolas Durand

Cardiff Blues: Leigh Halfpenny, Alex Cuthbert, Gavin Evans, Jamie Roberts, Harry Robinson, Rhys Patchell, Lewis Jones; Sam Hobbs, Rhys Williams, Beniot Bourrust, James Down, Lou Reed, Josh Navidi (capt), Sam Warburton, Robin Copeland.

Replacements: Kristian Dacey, Nathan Trevett, Scott Andrews, Macauley Cook, Luke Hamilton, Gareth Davies, Ceri Sweeney, Owen Williams

Halfpenny and Cuthbert return from injury to start. Tovey is unavailable to travel due to his puppy chewing up his passport, otherwise I assume he would be there instead of Sweeney. Bradley Davies is out injured but forunately Toulon have found it within their hearts to rest Bakkies Botha.

Bastareaud unstoppable. Try.

Hmmmm

38 - 8

Ceri Sweeney on, giving Patchell a rest I guess

Blues scrum no 10...

...Blues penalty

Blues 6 - 4 Hayman (though he has now gone off)

Wilkinson off...so they replace him with Giteau.

*sigh*

Blues hold off a powerful Toulon rolling maul

Blues scrum no11...

...early hit by Toulon, free kick...

Blues 7 - 4 Toulon (from Blues put in)

Steffan Armatige powers through and the replacement prop smashes over Halfpenny to score.

45 - 8

Owen Williams breaks through the Toulon defence. He is deceptively strong

Some good passing by Roberts and Cuthbert scores in the corner.

Excellent try, Owen Williams deserve to keep the 13 shirt having FINALLY managed to steal it with Gavin Evans late withdrawal.

Halfpenny misses the conversion, he won't be happy with 1 from 3.

45 - 13

Owen Williams almost breaks through again, but is taken around the head and wins the Blues a penalty.

Toulon scrum no2...

...Blues win it against the head...somehow

Cuthbert chases the kick and gets it, and the Blues are now attacking the Toulon half

Blues turn over ball again on their own line, they are still putting in the effort to avoid conceeding again.

The Blues have no scrumhalves left, so we have put on the RFC Flyhalf Davies at SH. Bizarre.

He immediately messes up a clearing box kick.

Bastareaud down injured, not looking good

Cuthbert and Halfpenny cover well to prevent a try from Toulons quick tap

Warburton stealing on the deck

Daffydd Hewitt does his best to man sausage up a certain try created by Dacey, Cuthbert, Warburton and Sweeney's offloading in midfield

Try

Halfpenny misses another

45 - 18

Blues looking for a TBP with 80 on the clock

AND HALFPENNY breaks through ever Toulon tackle and the Blues have a point. Excellent.

That length of the field try ends the game.

FT Toulon 45 - 25 Blues

Good effort from the Blues. Couple more conversions from 1/2p would have made the score line a little closer but Toulon are a top side with some fantastic players so well done to the Blues for really sticking in there.

Williams has to be our 13 now surely. He gives us some excellent running options and did more today than Evans has done all season in the 13 jersey.

Totally agree on Owen Williams.

Wales606,

Give it a break with the running commentary. Pointless.

A bit of talk about Toulon's foreigners and money, but of the 7 tries they scored, 6 were by Frenchmen and 3 of those have progressed from the academy.

Well done Blues on not getting beat by as much as we all thought you would.

who am i kidding?! how pathetic from the Blues so feeble in the tight five and a scrum half who hasn't got a clue of his duties in attack and DEFENCE!

Regional rugby need to take a leaf out of the Ospreys book and ditch the old farts.

View, who were the old farts in the Blues team? Gavin Evans was the oldest at 28. The rest were 26 and under by my reckoning. 28 isn't that old in rugby terms. Or are you talking about the subs?

Sorry, scrap that just realised it was Gavin Evans who withdrew for Owen Williams. So 26 was the oldest!

Managment men, griff the men with the money and ideas"old farts"
Hore makes the rest of the regional big wigs look like amateurs

Griff wrote:Sorry, scrap that just realised it was Gavin Evans who withdrew for Owen Williams. So 26 was the oldest!

Not to mention we had 2 teenagers in the starting 15.

Bourrust was the oldest player in the Blues starting 15 at 27, and he is swapping starting duties with Andrews

Copeland again showed up very well, as did Owen Williams and Cuthbert (as usual), thought Bourrust looked better at tighthead than Andrews.
Navidi maybe a bit lightweight, i would prefer a backrow of 6 Pretorius 7 Warburton/Navidi 8 Copeland.

VinceWLB wrote:Copeland again showed up very well, as did Owen Williams and Cuthbert (as usual), thought Bourrust looked better at tighthead than Andrews.
Navidi maybe a bit lightweight, i would prefer a backrow of 6 Pretorius 7 Warburton/Navidi 8 Copeland.

Navidi may be lightweight, but he is an excellent tackler. He is our player of the season so far and adapted will to play 6 aswell as 7.

Was at the game today in Toulon. Great match, Blues played well.

Toulon are a hell of a team.

viewtothegym wrote:Managment men, griff the men with the money and ideas"old farts"
Hore makes the rest of the regional big wigs look like amateurs

Eh?! You're comparing apples and oranges view. Hore is the elite performance director, not the money man or big wig at the Os. I'm sure the Ospreys have got an old fart money man or two knocking around too. Hore is the equivalent of director of rugby, like Connor O'Shea at Harlequins, Dai Young at Wasps, Mark McCall at Sarries, Phil Davies when he was at Leeds and possibly now at Blues (not sure of his title), and Rob Beale at the Dragons. If you want to compare then compare him with them. They're not exactly old farts, but the regions could do better with their DORs. Especially Beale at the Dragons. But drop these directors of rugby for who? More experienced and successful DORs come at a cost, as Hore does for the Os I'm sure.

Or have I missed your point again? Are you really suggesting that Hore is the equivalent of Tony Brown and Peter Thomas?

Griff wrote:

viewtothegym wrote:Managment men, griff the men with the money and ideas"old farts"
Hore makes the rest of the regional big wigs look like amateurs

Eh?! You're comparing apples and oranges view. Hore is the elite performance director, not the money man or big wig at the Os. I'm sure the Ospreys have got an old fart money man or two knocking around too. Hore is the equivalent of director of rugby, like Connor O'Shea at Harlequins, Dai Young at Wasps, Mark McCall at Sarries, Phil Davies when he was at Leeds and possibly now at Blues (not sure of his title), and Rob Beale at the Dragons. If you want to compare then compare him with them. They're not exactly old farts, but the regions could do better with their DORs. Especially Beale at the Dragons. But drop these directors of rugby for who? More experienced and successful DORs come at a cost, as Hore does for the Os I'm sure.

Or have I missed your point again? Are you really suggesting that Hore is the equivalent of Tony Brown and Peter Thomas?

I bet Hore wishes he had the money PT has.

Cuddy is the Ospreys money man.

And Roger Blythe I believe.

wales606 wrote:

VinceWLB wrote:Copeland again showed up very well, as did Owen Williams and Cuthbert (as usual), thought Bourrust looked better at tighthead than Andrews.
Navidi maybe a bit lightweight, i would prefer a backrow of 6 Pretorius 7 Warburton/Navidi 8 Copeland.

Navidi may be lightweight, but he is an excellent tackler. He is our player of the season so far and adapted will to play 6 aswell as 7.

If Bradley played it probably would have took some pressure off the back-row. I don't think the back-row is lightweight, it's got good balance to it. Those two 7's cover a lot of ground. As does Copeland who is also a good carrier.