Scotland v Argentina, 19 November

MacKnocked-on wrote:I see Bath v Bristol is on BT Sport this evening with Mitch Eadie playing at 6 for Bristol, be interesting to see how he gets on. He's certainly another very fast back row player like Bradbury so might well be an option at blindside going forward with Bradbury likely to be a good pick at 8.

reallybored wrote:Can't get over how young our team is, especially in important positions.

TH prop - 20 year old
TH lock - 22 year old
Fly half - 24 year old
Full back - 24 year old

All four of those guys have potential to be World Class imo and two are close already.

Riskysports wrote:Gilchrist...

Been thinking of him for a while now....sad i know

I think this game is actually one we should judge him on, and this is the reason.

So far he has been hit with injuries and even when back, he has only ever been given 10-15 mins to do anything. He is up against 2 fantastic locks to compete, who work very well together. It is always going to be tough to shine, especially when we wet our rugby shorts a bit much over the brothers Gray on occasion (and gloss over mistakes they make).

I actually thought he was ok when he came on last week. Got involved, took the ball on and got over the gain line and gave us some go forward (remember J Gray is not actually a great line breaker - only makes about a yard each time he carries).

I think him getting a start, so a whole game to prove himself, with the great J Gray beside him is how we should really judge him - against a good team, but not an unbeatable team

And we should also judge him how we judge others i.e. not look for the faults rather than to good stuff

#generousfriday

EWT Spoons wrote:Quick question here, there is a rugby podcast (i'm not going to name it because that would seem like I'm advertising it), who seem to, in my opinion at least, know very little about rugby.  I want to check with yourselves if maybe I'm being one eyed or harsh on them.

They claim that B.Toolis is "stealing a living" by playing rugby and should be working in some other field because he's not a rugby player.  They also seem to think A.Toolis was so much worse and (again lack of rugby knowledge) believe him to be playing amateur rugby in NZ now.

One of them also seems to think R.Gray had a poor game on sat, and the 23 tackles was the minimum you would expect from him.  Which seems to ignore that he was involved in some capacity in all 3 of our tries.

So my question is, am I being harsh and perhaps Toolis (Ben specifically) isn't as good as I think.  Or they have no idea what they are wittering on about?

EWT Spoons wrote:Quick question here, there is a rugby podcast (i'm not going to name it because that would seem like I'm advertising it), who seem to, in my opinion at least, know very little about rugby.  I want to check with yourselves if maybe I'm being one eyed or harsh on them.

They claim that B.Toolis is "stealing a living" by playing rugby and should be working in some other field because he's not a rugby player.  They also seem to think A.Toolis was so much worse and (again lack of rugby knowledge) believe him to be playing amateur rugby in NZ now.

One of them also seems to think R.Gray had a poor game on sat, and the 23 tackles was the minimum you would expect from him.  Which seems to ignore that he was involved in some capacity in all 3 of our tries.

So my question is, am I being harsh and perhaps Toolis (Ben specifically) isn't as good as I think.  Or they have no idea what they are wittering on about?

RDW_Scotland wrote:That is utter horse crap.  What podcast is it?

Did the Toolis brothers pick on them when they were young or something??

Alex Toolis signed a 2 year deal with Melbourne Rebels.

The Richie Gray chat is also utter Love sacks.

EWT Spoons wrote:

RDW_Scotland wrote:That is utter horse crap.  What podcast is it?

Did the Toolis brothers pick on them when they were young or something??

Alex Toolis signed a 2 year deal with Melbourne Rebels.

The Richie Gray chat is also utter Love sacks.

It's called the Thistle, which claims to be the only podcast that cares about Scottish rugby.  They are 3 episodes in.  I've listened to all 3 just because I am fascinated to hear what toss they come up with next.

Yeah I can only assume they played against one/both of the Toolis at club level.  Indeed he did sign for the rebels which is why I think they have no idea what they are talking about.

Personally I thought Ritchie had a superb performance against Australia, but they've been calling for him to be dropped in favour of Gilchrist, or Swinson.  They were also happy that Wilson was involved and hoped he would be back fit for the game against Argentina.

RDW_Scotland wrote:

EWT Spoons wrote:

RDW_Scotland wrote:That is utter horse crap.  What podcast is it?

Did the Toolis brothers pick on them when they were young or something??

Alex Toolis signed a 2 year deal with Melbourne Rebels.

The Richie Gray chat is also utter Love sacks.

It's called the Thistle, which claims to be the only podcast that cares about Scottish rugby.  They are 3 episodes in.  I've listened to all 3 just because I am fascinated to hear what toss they come up with next.

Yeah I can only assume they played against one/both of the Toolis at club level.  Indeed he did sign for the rebels which is why I think they have no idea what they are talking about.

Personally I thought Ritchie had a superb performance against Australia, but they've been calling for him to be dropped in favour of Gilchrist, or Swinson.  They were also happy that Wilson was involved and hoped he would be back fit for the game against Argentina.

Their credibility is entirely ruined with that one!

RDW_Scotland wrote:They are maybe going for the Daily Mail approach - if you have a sensible, well informed and well researched podcast no-one will listen to you.  If you are deliberately confrontational, talk crap and just make stuff up then you get publicity.

Why do you think this forum is so popular??

RDW_Scotland wrote:They are maybe going for the Daily Mail approach - if you have a sensible, well informed and well researched podcast no-one will listen to you.  If you are deliberately confrontational, talk crap and just make stuff up then you get publicity.

Why do you think this forum is so popular??

tigertattie wrote:

reallybored wrote:Can't get over how young our team is, especially in important positions.

TH prop - 20 year old
TH lock - 22 year old
Fly half - 24 year old
Full back - 24 year old

All four of those guys have potential to be World Class imo and two are close already.

World class?

lets calm down a sec here!

Ickle Jonny has the potential but there others........

Hogg I'll give you as he can be special but needs to work on his mental game and be more consistent.

Fagerson? Come on now. Good luck to the laddie but lets not go getting ahead of ourselves here!

Russell? No chance. He's decent but that's it. He's also a member of the hot an cold club!

tigertattie wrote:

RDW_Scotland wrote:They are maybe going for the Daily Mail approach - if you have a sensible, well informed and well researched podcast no-one will listen to you.  If you are deliberately confrontational, talk crap and just make stuff up then you get publicity.

Why do you think this forum is so popular??

well it's not because of the professionalism of the moderators or Admins!

RDW_Scotland wrote:

tigertattie wrote:

RDW_Scotland wrote:They are maybe going for the Daily Mail approach - if you have a sensible, well informed and well researched podcast no-one will listen to you.  If you are deliberately confrontational, talk crap and just make stuff up then you get publicity.

Why do you think this forum is so popular??

well it's not because of the professionalism of the moderators or Admins!

It's like you want to get banned!

tigertattie wrote:

reallybored wrote:Can't get over how young our team is, especially in important positions.

TH prop - 20 year old
TH lock - 22 year old
Fly half - 24 year old
Full back - 24 year old

All four of those guys have potential to be World Class imo and two are close already.

World class?

lets calm down a sec here!

Ickle Jonny has the potential but there others........

Hogg I'll give you as he can be special but needs to work on his mental game and be more consistent.

Fagerson? Come on now. Good luck to the laddie but lets not go getting ahead of ourselves here!

Russell? No chance. He's decent but that's it. He's also a member of the hot an cold club!

RDW_Scotland wrote:That is utter horse crap.  What podcast is it?

Did the Toolis brothers pick on them when they were young or something??

Alex Toolis signed a 2 year deal with Melbourne Rebels.

The Richie Gray chat is also utter Love sacks.

reallybored wrote:

tigertattie wrote:

reallybored wrote:Can't get over how young our team is, especially in important positions.

TH prop - 20 year old
TH lock - 22 year old
Fly half - 24 year old
Full back - 24 year old

All four of those guys have potential to be World Class imo and two are close already.

World class?

lets calm down a sec here!

Ickle Jonny has the potential but there others........

Hogg I'll give you as he can be special but needs to work on his mental game and be more consistent.

Fagerson? Come on now. Good luck to the laddie but lets not go getting ahead of ourselves here!

Russell? No chance. He's decent but that's it. He's also a member of the hot an cold club!

I only said potential.

Hogg is definitely knocking on the World Class door and is 3/4 years younger than the others in his position (Smith, Folau).

Fagerson is a pup, shows up well in the loose however scrummaging can still be a weakness but that'll improve with time.  Who would you say is a World Class TH, Franks and ....?

No chance for Russell?  Again, still a relative youngster in his position and has a wonderful set of skills that can't be coached, needs to learn to control a match better though.

J Gray is quickly becoming the best Scottish forward I've ever seen, his consistency is ridiculous.

Scotland v Argentina: Plenty to play for against unpredictable Pumas

By Tom English
BBC Scotland
From the section Scottish Rugby

Argentina's 2016 rugby odyssey began in late May with a trip across the Rio de la Plata from Buenos Aires to Colonia del Sacremento, an old town in southwest Uruguay.

There they played their first Test match of the year. Since then, it's been an expedition across the continents. From Uruguay to Chile, from America back to Argentina and onwards to South Africa, New Zealand and Australia before playing the Wallabies in London, Japan in Tokyo, Wales in Cardiff and, now, Scotland in Edinburgh.

Come Saturday, the Pumas will have played 14 Tests in 10 countries in less than six months - and it'll be 15 Tests by the time the curtain comes down on their year.

Scotland will welcome an explosive but inconsistent side to Murrayfield, but also one that can't be far away from keeling over from exhaustion.

This has been a weird fixture in recent years, one that Scotland largely dominated despite the major advances that the Pumas have made in that time. The Scots have won four of the last five including three straight wins in Argentina's own backyard.

The one Scotland lost, of course, was the one that mattered most of all - the 13-12 defeat in Wellington at the 2011 World Cup.

The last five years of these meetings is the classic study of how Scotland are capable of winning games that don't really matter while losing the one that really does.

Argentina come into this on the back of a scrappy loss to Wales and a thumping defeat of Japan. Before that they won one out of six in the Rugby Championship, their sole victory coming against South Africa, an isolated success story when set alongside their five other games.

They lost to Australia by 12 points and 16 points, lost their away leg to South Africa by 13 points and lost to New Zealand by a combined total of 54 points.

Against Scotland, they're going in with 11 of the players that did for South Africa and 10 of the men who knocked Ireland out of the World Cup just over a year ago. That was Argentina at their maximum. Quick, accurate, savagely physical and mentally tough.

They were fourth in the world rankings after that huge victory over Joe Schmidt's team, had fallen to sixth before they lost to Wales last weekend and now lie eighth, just one place ahead of Scotland.

In world ranking points, this is an important one for Scotland. In the wake of their late and painful 23-22 defeat to Australia it's also important for their self-esteem to nail this. Scotland put themselves into a winning position and couldn't see it out. They'll have beaten themselves up over that.

For all the mountain of good stuff they delivered, the bottom line was cruel and familiar. These guys have been in that movie before.

This will be Vern Cotter's 30th Test as Scotland coach and Magnus Bradbury will be his 25th new cap. The Edinburgh back-row is only 21 and has earned his chance. Even if John Hardie hadn't been injured and Cornell du Preez had been deemed ready for action, Bradbury had an outstanding claim in any event.

He's a dynamic presence and can carry ball. Scotland have a number of decent back-rows but Bradbury might just have the tools to be an outstanding one. He's up against two major carriers in Pablo Matera and Facundo Isa in the Pumas back-row, both only two years older than him but with 55 caps between them.

This Test is about momentum ahead of the Six Nations, about creating a habit of establishing a lead and holding on to it.

In the background there is also the Lions. Players won't be fussing about that just yet. Even if they were dreaming about it they would never admit it.

It's early, but not early. There's five months to go over before Warren Gatland names his squad but, put another way, there's only seven more Test matches and probably only five of them count for much.

The Scottish players have masses of ground to make up on English, Irish and Welsh players. Right now, you'd say there is only one Scot guaranteed his place and that's Stuart Hogg. Gatland is no diplomat. He's not going to pick players on a quota system.

There are, of course, an array of others in with a shout, but the competition is intense and they have to be deemed outsiders as it stands. They're playing catch-up against players who are winning big.

That's part of why Saturday against the Wallabies was so painful for Scotland. It was a chance to send an early message.

To attract Gatland's attention away from the seemingly unbeatable Englishmen, the All Black-beating Irishmen and the Welshmen he knows and respects so much, the Scots are going to have to deliver eye-popping wins. They almost had one. Almost.

They go again on Saturday against the globe-trotting Pumas.

cakeordeath wrote:The joy of being a Scottish rugby supporter as you slowly feel your optimism drain away and be replaced with fear