Aviva Premiership - Round 21

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Table





Fixtures

Fri 29th Apr 16

19:45 Sale Sharks  v   Gloucester Rugby BT Sport
Sharks play-off hopes are now out of their own hands, however they are in prime position to secure a Champions Cup spot. They should have the arsenal needed to overcome an underwhelming and injury ridden Gloucester team. As often much will rest on the performance of Danny Cipriani. Having failed to get his drunk driving case thrown out, he has been bailed again until 26th May. This means that unlike last week he will have had a full week of training behind him.


Sat 30th Apr 16

15:00 Leicester Tigers  v  Worcester Warriors
Tigers need to win this game to guarantee 4th spot and a probable visit to Barnet in Mid-May. After a sequence of massive games with minimal rotation, they also need to rest some players. Could Worcester provide the banana skin that is needed to give hopes to Tiger's chasers. Yes they can, attimes they have been enterprising and effective this season, but really they should be beaten with "relative" ease.

15:15 Northampton Saints  v  Bath Rugby BT Sport
Saints hopes of making the play-offs are hanging by a thread that will be cut should Leicester beat Worcester. Bath meanwhile have only a mathematical chance of making the Champions Cup. Despite a seriously misfiring back division, Saints should have too much for a rudderless Bath XV.


Sun 1st May 16

13:00 Exeter Chiefs  v   Wasps BT Sport
Exeter will seek revenge for their Champions cup defeat to Wasps and overtake the visitors in the fight for the second home semi final and what should be 4th meeting between these two teams this season. Wasps will be smarting over their defeat at Sarries hands at the weekend and looking to put in a massive performance. Game of the round and too hard to call.

15:00 London Irish  v   Harlequins
London Irish are not down yet, but need to win this game to have any chance of survival. Quins can still sneak into the Top 6, but may well feel that the Challenge Cup gives them a chance of both silverware and the Champions cup for next season. It will take a huge improvement for LI to win this game, yet for some reason I think they will.

15:15 Saracens v  Newcastle Falcons BT Sport
If Newcastle win this game they are safe. There is a good chance that Sarries may choose to rest a large number of players, so the visitors should not be discounted.

At least in the championships you should be able to chop and change.

and come next season your U18's will be U19/U20's with a fair amount of championship rugby under there belt and you should know who has what it takes to make it and who doesn't.

Ozzy3213 wrote:He's got lots of potential yappy, a year in the Championship could really make him.  It's a crazy situation though with regard to our 10 jersey.  This year it's been a key problem, with retirements and injuries which effectively forced us to blood Brophy-Clews.  At the current moment in time we have 5 senior 10's signed for next season, Marshall, Bell, Tonks, Geraghty and Noakes, which could effectively push him down the pecking order.  I suspect however that Geraghty and Noakes will be off.  Tonks confirmed to a friend of mine yesterday that he will be with us next season, and I was told by someone from inside the club that Marshall is definitely coming.  Will be interesting to see where TBC features amongst it all.

Noakes is out of contract, isn't he?

You're right though. Theo will actually have more players in his way next year than he did this season. I think he'll play a fair bit though, looks a real prospect to me and is obviously trusted by the coaching team. 10 and 15 could be any one of a number of combinations really. Always good to have options given our injury record.

Edit - BTW do you know if Matt Williams is injured? Hasn't featured at all for the Eng U18s since being named in the initial squad.

interesting out of those 6 10's how many are actually out and out 10?

Bell 10/15
Marshall 10/15
Geraghty 10/12
Tonks 10/12/15

only really Noakes and TBC.