Ospreys vs Falcons Challenge Cup Friday 19:05

Ospreys: Dan Evans; Dafydd Howells, Ben John, Ashley Beck, Eli Walker; Dan Biggar, Rhys Webb; Paul James, Scott Baldwin, Ma'afu Fia, Rory Thornton, Alun Wyn Jones (Capt), Dan Lydiate, Justin Tipuric, Dan Baker.

Replacements: Sam Parry, Gareth Thomas, Rhodri Jones, Lloyd Ashley, James King, Tom Habberfield, Sam Davies, Josh Matavesi.

Newcastle Falcons: Brett Connon; Marcus Watson, Fred Burdon (captain), Craig Willis, Belisario Agulla; Joel Hodgson, Michael Young; Alex Rogers, Ben Sowrey, David Wilson, Will Witty, Nick Civetta, Glen Young, Daniel Temm, Harrison Orr

Replacements: David Nelson, Sam Lockwood, Andrew Foster, Mouritz Botha, Callum Chick, Sam Egerton, Juan Pablo Socino, Alex Tait.

Referee: David Wilkinson (Ire)

Assistant referees: Kieran Barry, Shane Kiernans (Ire).

maestegmafia wrote:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UfpHFYkTaSk&sns=em

Come on Maes going by that interview what do you think our team will be on Friday?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UfpHFYkTaSk&sns=em

The teams have met once before, an 18-17 win at Kingston Park, Newcastle, 2 tries to 1.

Ospreys have been playing some exciting rugby scoring a good number of tries sitting in third in the Pro12. They have played half their games against teams in the top half of the league and half against teams ranked at the bottom. There are mixed views on whether their form is overhyped jabbing played lowly Connacht, Zebre and Treviso.

They passed last weeks clash with the Blues with top marks. This Friday sees a test further with their first match in this competition.

There are a few injuries and a few players who have not played much this season. There are a couple of Welsh stars who have not hit the ground running. For those reasons we might see Dan Lydiate, Dan Biggar and Scott Baldwin starting from the Bench

4 players have started every match Arhip, Tipuric, Matavesi and Hassler in the GL, obviously Jeff will be out and going by Tandy's interview I don't think any of the others will start, both Sam Parry and Dan Evans have started every game bar one, Baldwin will cover for Parry, I wonder who will deputise for Dan could they give Dafydd Howells a run out there, to me that is the exciting choice, it could be a Leonard Biggar half back partnership, I think they'll go for an Ashley Thornton/Beard boilerhouse, King to 7 with probably Cracknell at 6, with Fia and James partnering Baldwin who IMO needs a very good game to keep his Welsh squad place.
So my team would be Howells, Grabham, John, Beck, Walker, Biggar, Leonard, James, Baldwin, Fia, Ashley, Thornton, Cracknell, King and Baker, I also wouldn't be surprised to see Gareth Thomas in the front row, and would not be disappointed if Ashley was not in there.

wayne wrote: Howells, Grabham, John, Beck, Walker, Biggar, Leonard, James, Baldwin, Fia, Ashley, Thornton, Cracknell, King and Baker, I also wouldn't be surprised to see Gareth Thomas in the front row, and would not be disappointed if Ashley was not in there.    

I would have thought there would be less surprise selections. Falcons may be sitting just outside the top four in the English premiership but they have had some narrow results apart from the pasting they got at Bath. They did well away against Gloucester.

There form is far better home than away. Maybe similar to the Ospreys they have played some of the softer teams and won, Worcester, Bristol. A narrow home loss to the Tigers...!

I think our squad can fight on two fronts this season.

maestegmafia wrote:

wayne wrote: Howells, Grabham, John, Beck, Walker, Biggar, Leonard, James, Baldwin, Fia, Ashley, Thornton, Cracknell, King and Baker, I also wouldn't be surprised to see Gareth Thomas in the front row, and would not be disappointed if Ashley was not in there.    

I would have thought there would be less surprise selections. Falcons may be sitting just outside the top four in the English premiership but they have had some narrow results apart from the pasting they got at Bath. They did well away against Gloucester.

There form is far better home than away. Maybe similar to the Ospreys they have played some of the softer teams and won, Worcester, Bristol. A narrow home loss to the Tigers...!

I think our squad can fight on two fronts this season.

Maes, have to say, I forgot about Lydiate he will be in surely, probably 6 but could be 7, if you watched that interview you posted and the after match Press Conference last Friday night you'll see Tandy talking about making a number of changes, I've just picked on the players that have started all or nearly all our matches.

Have you seen the Match preview that is on the website now, Beck and Eli are interviewed.

maestegmafia wrote:

wayne wrote: Howells, Grabham, John, Beck, Walker, Biggar, Leonard, James, Baldwin, Fia, Ashley, Thornton, Cracknell, King and Baker, I also wouldn't be surprised to see Gareth Thomas in the front row, and would not be disappointed if Ashley was not in there.    

I would have thought there would be less surprise selections. Falcons may be sitting just outside the top four in the English premiership but they have had some narrow results apart from the pasting they got at Bath. They did well away against Gloucester.

There form is far better home than away. Maybe similar to the Ospreys they have played some of the softer teams and won, Worcester, Bristol. A narrow home loss to the Tigers...!

I think our squad can fight on two fronts this season.

They lost to Worcester Maes.

stub wrote:

maestegmafia wrote:

wayne wrote: Howells, Grabham, John, Beck, Walker, Biggar, Leonard, James, Baldwin, Fia, Ashley, Thornton, Cracknell, King and Baker, I also wouldn't be surprised to see Gareth Thomas in the front row, and would not be disappointed if Ashley was not in there.    

I would have thought there would be less surprise selections. Falcons may be sitting just outside the top four in the English premiership but they have had some narrow results apart from the pasting they got at Bath. They did well away against Gloucester.

There form is far better home than away. Maybe similar to the Ospreys they have played some of the softer teams and won, Worcester, Bristol. A narrow home loss to the Tigers...!

I think our squad can fight on two fronts this season.

They lost to Worcester Maes.

Your right they did.. Close game..!

Bit of a mixed bag...!

What you think of them stubb?

I think Ospreys will beat them at home. They are capable of some great play but inconsistent. Their scrum was suspect against Worcester.

stub wrote:I think Ospreys will beat them at home. They are capable of some great play but inconsistent. Their scrum was suspect against Worcester.

Ours has been too a few times

They have tended also to randomly kick away pocession to no good effect. This has driven their 606 fans to distraction on the Aviva Prem threads..

stub wrote:They have tended also to randomly kick away pocession to no good effect. This has driven their 606 fans to distraction on the Aviva Prem threads..

Ospreys have done well with counter attacks and have shown a very tidy defence in the last two games.

Going from previous seasons Deano will treat this competition as a development opportunity and load it up with our young guns, mainly those that are English to ensure we have a decent % at the end of the season.

I doubt there will be many regular first teamers.

TrailApe wrote:Going from previous seasons Deano will treat this competition as a development opportunity and load it up with our young guns, mainly those that are English to ensure we have a decent % at the end of the season.

I doubt there will be many regular first teamers.

Not quite sure what team we will put out. As our mate says above Tandy seems keen to give a bit of rotation to the squad.

We should play the team that will play for us during the internationals to give them time on the pitch together.

The international period has been our undoing in previous years so its vital that we give our second teamers a run out together.

If that means no Biggar or AWJ etc then so be it as the league should be our priority and im confident in our squad that we can qualify out of the group (If the Dragons can do it then.....)

Newcastle Falcons team to face Ospreys (Friday, Liberty Stadium, 7.05pm)

15 Brett Connon
14 Marcus Watson
13 Fred Burdon (captain)
12 Craig Willis
11 Belisario Agulla
10 Joel Hodgson

9 Michael Young
1 Alex Rogers
2 Ben Sowrey
3 David Wilson
4 Will Witty
5 Nick Civetta
6 Glen Young
7 Daniel Temm
8 Harrison Orr

Replacements
16 David Nelson
17 Sam Lockwood
18 Andrew Foster
19 Mouritz Botha
20 Callum Chick
21 Sam Egerton
22 Juan Pablo Socino
23 Alex Tait

Referee: David Wilkinson (Ireland)

Ospreys Team
Dan Evans, Dafydd Howells, Ben John, Ashley Beck, Eli Walker, Dan Biggar, Rhys Webb, Paul James, Scott Baldwin, Ma'afu Fia, AWJ, Rory Thornton, Dan Lydiate, Justin Tipuric Dan Baker with Sam Parry, Gareth Thomas, Rhodri Jones, Lloyd Ashley, James King, Tom Habberfield, Sam Davies and Josh Matavesi on the bench.

So from last weeks match there are 8 changes, I expected both AWJ and Tips to have been rested for this one, this is a very strong 15 with some influential changes to come on, Tandy is taking this competition very seriously.

Well its going to be curious to see how our young lads go against your side.

I expect we'll get beat, but theres a couple of our players that im hoping (expecting) to show up well....

GeordieFalcon wrote:Well its going to be curious to see how our young lads go against your side.

I expect we'll get beat, but theres a couple of our players that im hoping (expecting) to show up well....

Who do I need to look out for Geordie?

Well I would say you'll be in control for the most of the game...but the players ill be watching with most interest will be:

15 Brett Connon - 20yo Academy FH in the George Ford style. Skilled but slight of frame...being introduced from full back.

14 Marcus Watson - Just  a class act. Rapid, great step and strong defence. And an Olympic 7's silver medallist. Brother of England winger Anthony...and he should attract attention from the England selectors with so many injuries

12 Craig Willis - The young 10 hope being played at 12.

10 Joel Hodgson - The returning hope from several years back. He's right up against it v Biggar...but I want to see mentally how he copes with the challenge, and what he does with the ball that he'll get....

4 Will Witty - Young academy lad and former England u20. Has bulked up massively this summer a real big powerful unit...and absolutely electric pace for his size! Will be our starting lock by the end of this season or start of next.

8 Harrison Orr - Just joined...a former Aussie U20 backrower. Been injured but a big hard carrying unit

Replacements
20 Callum Chick - England U20 captain and number 8. A massive prospect.

Would have preferred to see Egerton start at nine, you might say that Young is there for experience, but if experience means box kicking everything too far, I don't want it!

We've got a pretty big front five out for this, I'm expecting to see a tighter game plan.

Chick is an interesting one, I don't know if he will have the power to compete against what looks like a surprisingly strong Osprey's back-row.

I thought we would get beat before I saw the teams, I reckon we'll get walloped now.

I think it will be a comfortable victory for the Ospreys but I just want to see how the above cope. Most of them are the future of the club...

Yes I too would much rather have had Egerton starting. He looked very lively in the pre season games.

Surprised to see such a strong Ospreys team picked for this.

I guess that bar Tips most of the internationals have only played a few games

Very surprising lineup considering we're off to France next week. I guess our young talent are playing in the B&I cup at the knoll against London Irish on sat so Tandy was limited in his choices.

I did fancy a five point win before the teams were announced considering our start to the season and Newcastles status in the Aviva and the lineups haven't changed my mind just reinforced it

Well we're 6th in the league and playing some very physical rugby in the forwards....however theres very few of the first team playing. They will however be expected to match the physical style...so hopefully it wont be too easy a game for you guys.

Sorry Geordie, didn't mean to come across arrogance just feel at home we're in good form right now and expect the team to continue playing well. I feel that this is some silverware that we can target.

Will look forward to seeing how the young Newcastle boys play

Oh I didn't take it as arrogance....all our fans agree its going to be an uphill battle all game! And probably a heavy defeat

Just hope a few of our young hopes make a good account of themselves.

Falcons 6th? That's much higher than I expected... I think Ospreys might have got a bonus point win even if they had made more changes to their lineup because right now they're playing at a very high intensity. There is no specific game plan apart from defend well and play heads up rugby - it enables them to score a lot of tries. If Ospreys score a few points early on then it's definitely curtains for Newcastle. Stranger things have happened than Falcons coming away with the win however, so don't take me too seriously.

Ah I cant see us getting anything out of this...bar a bit of pride if the youngsters show up well!

You can probably tell Deans sole focus is the league due to our habit of bottom dwelling. However there has been huge work on the kids / the academy and structures through the side...and slowly its starting to take effect.

He has always adopted the policy of blooding the kids in this competition. And many current first teamers have come through from that. And more will continue to come through.

From a Newcastle perspective that's understandable. Your youngsters have often showed up very well in previous challenge cups and I expect this year to be no different - but Quins, Ospreys and Blues are surely the most likely ones to come away with the trophy.

Deano on the BBC Sports page.

"It's not about developing youngsters, it's about giving people who deserve the chance, the chance to play. A lot of these boys are playing well at this moment so it's important they get this chance and stake their claim. And there's no better place to stake your claim than down at the Ospreys."

You little tinker deano - that's ALL its about - never mind your PR soundbytes for the sponsors.

I'm oot on the lash in the toon tonight, so probably won't know the score until tomorrow.

Not optimistic...

19-0 at half time and that's all I know. Can't comment on the performances.

40-0 ouch.... And still loads to go

19-0 to Falcons...?

Oh, missed that last post. 40-0 to Falcons??

yappysnap wrote:Oh, missed that last post. 40-0 to Falcons??

Nope

Nope 45-0

Apparently ospreys didn't get out of second gear.

Apparently also Joel Hodgson was exceptionally poor.

Can't fault the Newcastle players effort but they just got out played. It didn't help though that pretty much every clearance kick went straight to touch so gave Ospreys great field possession which they capitalised on.

Justin Tipuric try was absolutely epic, won't see another forward score a try like it. Got past a few players in his own half, chipped the ball and gathered it and then out sprinted three of the Newcastle backs to dive over for the try

True Raven wrote:Can't fault the Newcastle players effort but they just got out played.  It didn't help though that pretty much every clearance kick went straight to touch so gave Ospreys great field possession which they capitalised on.

Justin Tipuric try was absolutely epic, won't see another forward score a try like it.  Got past a few players in his own half, chipped the ball and gathered it and then out sprinted three of the Newcastle backs to dive over for the try

Yes TR, you won't see many backs score a try like that never mind a forward, worth the admission fee on its own, if anybody has the chance to see it they should grab the opportunity, can I also say what a joke the officials were in respect to Falcons kickoffs, they were offside at nearly everyone and I think only penalised for one, when the O/H delayed his kick and most of the players were about 5 yards offside, and even then they weren't brought back immediately.

Yeah I saw the try. Im huge fan of his, but do you not think it should have been shut down. The ospreys wouldn't have let that be scored.

Did we kick the ball too much?

Did any of our lads stand up?

The first 15 minutes seemed to be all Newcastle possession and their defence held up well gaining turnovers and forcing mistakes but their arrack was blunt and forced them to kick behind our backs but the kicking was poor to be honest.

Once Biggar got his try, Newcastles defence then started to miss tackles and Ospreys then got past the defence and scored the try's

Line out was 100% I think and even stole ball. But the scrum went backwards every time which would be a concern as maafu fia and rhodri jones are not scrummaging tight heads.

In terms of individual players, in the first 15 minutes Marcus Watson made a nice break but after that possession was given up and the ball was rarely passed through the hands

Tipuric's try was class, but I'd be furious with the defence if it was my team yeah. As South Wales Argus reporter Chris Kirwan said, great effort by the Newcastle hooker to try stopping it, but even he overtakes two or three defenders. Is he that fast?

Presumably you've seen highlights? I tried the EPC rugby site but there aren't any available for the Welsh games.

The try has its own article on the South Wales evening post website but the highlights you'll have to wait until the Ospreys website uploads them

There's a few vids on twitter, brilliant try, he is quick!!

Yeah that sums up our season.

Lots of possession, couldn't score in a brothel because our attack is woeful.

This then resorts to kicking and our kicking is appalling.
Our fans have been moaning about this all this and last season. With no improvement!

I was dismayed to see Tipuric fly past our backs. That shouldn't be happening but then to see Sowery flying pas them aswell...dear Lord that's bad!

GeordieFalcon wrote:Yeah that sums up our season.

Lots of possession,  couldn't score in a brothel because our attack is woeful.  

This then resorts to kicking and our kicking is appalling.  
Our fans have been moaning about this all this and last season. With no improvement!

I was dismayed to see Tipuric fly past our backs. That shouldn't be happening but then to see Sowery flying pas them aswell...dear Lord that's bad!

Geordie, considering who you put out I wouldn't be too dismayed, as TR said you had the ball for a very long period, must have been about 15 to 20 phases and then we had it and kicked it back to you and you had it for another 10 or so phases, you didn't make much ground apart from a mini break by Watson and all that was from the kick off. Webb made a good break when he spotted a pretty big gap around the fringes drew the last man and fed Biggar to run in all of 10 yards at the most. Webb then did a dink over the top and caught it from about 10 yards out and then just run in, that sort of demoralised some of your players IMO, because you were well in it up to then.
I know I'm biased but can anybody agree with my feeling that nobody else (forward), definitely within Wales and as far as I'm concerned within the UK would have scored that try, absolutely brilliant.

I understand that mate, but in each game this season we have at times dominated possession. But the complete failure to score any suitable amount of points from that is actually bad.
The fact that the 2nd / development players have the same issue has to raise serious concerns.... Especially when there doesn't seem to be much improvement in that area.

This then has a knock on of sending us back to over kicking and just giving the opposition the ball and piling more pressure on us.

Who devises these tactics.....because apparently it's not Dean.

We're in 6th but have a run of the top 4 sides coming up so that will show us where we are.

Fair play to the Falcons fans in the east who never stopped shouting encouragement and clapped our tries. Laughed when they spotted each other and shouted over "There's thuteen o wuh here"