Glasgow Warriors v Dragons Saturday 22nd February

Glasgow Warriors v Dragons
Scotstoun Stadium
Glasgow

Saturday 22nd February
KO 19.35

Live on Premier Sport

Well Glasgow get the Saturday evening slot in the middle of a 6N weekend, hopefully their fans are not in a state of shock following the Italy v Scotland game which preceeds it!

Glasgow will be looking for some payback following their defeat earlier on in the season down in Newport and our visitors have proved themselves far sturdier opposition this season under the canny old coach, Dean Ryan, than in most recent seasons. They have made themselves hard to beat and in the process have knocked off a few good teams.

Both team will be understrength due to the international games and so it might come down to who has the deeper squad, in which case you would probably have to fancy the home side.

Glasgow may well benefit from having played last weekend as well, with the Drags game getting cancelled due to the weather. They have had a long break now and could come back from that a bit sluggish or refreshed and ready to go, time will tell on Saturday night.

I would like to see a Glasgow side out something like this:

1. Seuili
2. Dolokoto - good debut last weekend and we will lose our other 2 hookers to Scotland
3. Keeble - went well at TH last weekend
4. Nakarawa
5. Swinson
6. Harley
7. Gibbins - back from suspension
8. Wilson
9. Dobie - surely the game to give him a start
10. Horne P
11. DTH
12. McDowell
13. Grigg
14. Niko
15. Bryce

Subs:

Allen
Stewart/Mathews - depending who is fit
Nicol
Davidson
Gordon/Fusaro - depending if we get TG back from the Scotland camp
Frisbee
Jackson
Steyn/Tagive - depending on who we get back

Not very confident about this at all.

I expect we will see something like this from Dragons

Harris, Hibbard (IF fit), Jarvis (presuming he is fit), Big Joe Davies, Screech, Griffiths, Basham (assuming release from Team Wales), Keddie, Rhodri Williams, Sam Davies, Rosser, Dixon, Warren, Howells, Hewitt.

RiscaGame wrote:Not very confident about this at all.

I expect we will see something like this from Dragons

Harris, Hibbard (IF fit)is the Fat Lad ever fit, in an aerobic sense? Mind you, Fat Lad versus DoubleD should be seismic., Jarvis (presuming he is fit), Big Joe Davies, Screech, Griffiths, Basham (assuming release from Team Wales), Keddie, Rhodri Williams, Sam Davies, Rosser, Dixon, Warren, Howells, Hewitt.

If Glasgow perform as they did against Zebre they should win comfortably. Two big caveats though; they can't get all narcissistic and start "playing up their own backsides" as Little Big Horne said after that match, and the loss of Horne to Scotland (if Toonie has any sense) means WHY?? will be back in the 23. I'm willing to believe that he is a decent 9 but he hasn't really adjusted to NH rugby. So will DR begin with the House-Elf or will he go with WHY??

I'd like to see
9. House-Elf
10. Furra Linee
11.DTH
12 Lord Stafford Of McDowall
13Battleship Griggtempkin
14. The Quiet Fijian or the very noisy one
15. Bryce.
they should do the job.

I'm surprised Tagive hasn't been released to get some gametime, especially given he's not exactly had much at all over the last 3 years!

Hopefully he plays this game.

Flounder, I have a sneaky feeling Toonie may unleash him against the Italians. It's a totally counter-intuitive feeling but...it is Toonie after all.

Mind you that would mean that Seaman would be all over the Dragons.

I think Toonie might have been willing to take z couple of punts against Italy if we had a W in the bag.

Can't see it happening in present circumstances

There would be absolutely no justification on picking Tagive based on any kind of form of playing history. It shows how little options we have on the wing that he was in the squad in the first place!

The side proposed by BG is decent. Bit concerning that 4 of the front 5 are non-SQ'd and I would like to see any of Stewart/Turner/Matthews be given the starting nod. Maybe Davidson for Swinson to have a leader come off the bench.

If we are not going to cap Tagive against Italy because of McGuigan or Steyn, I would want to see him start here. Same with Flash Gordon.

Frisbee should be left out the 23 entirely and have Mad Mata cover. Dobie has grown in stature with every game and has earned his opportunity to start. Heck, where is Kennedy?

Hazel Sapling wrote:The side proposed by BG is decent. Bit concerning that 4 of the front 5 are non-SQ'd and I would like to see any of Stewart/Turner/Matthews be given the starting nod. Maybe Davidson for Swinson to have a leader come off the bench.  

If we are not going to cap Tagive against Italy because of McGuigan or Steyn, I would want to see him start here. Same with Flash Gordon.

Frisbee should be left out the 23 entirely and have Mad Mata cover. Dobie has grown in stature with every game and has earned his opportunity to start. Heck, where is Kennedy?

I have a feeling Turner might well stay with Scotland and may even play, he has probably showed up better than the other two over the past few games and in all honesty, none of them are throwing well!

Mathews and Stewart were both listed as injured last week. I am not sure who might play if that is still the case.

https://www.theoffsideline.com/jamie-dobie-glasgow-warriors/

Pretty strong hint from Kenny Murray that Jamie Dobie may well be staring for Glasgow this Saturday.

From what we have seen so far, he is ready to go!

Seriously, if it comes down to a straight choice between WHY?? and the House-Elf it's the youngster every time.

I see Huw Jones was in the Glasgow Warriors media picture of them training today.

Looks like he may well be playing on Saturday

Maybe they took Steyn as the spare player to Italy as he can cover wing and centre

https://www.southwalesargus.co.uk/sport/18252452.welcome-guinness-pro14-return-ollie-griffiths-much-changed-dragons-side/

Glasgow team :

1. Aki Seiuli (9)
2. Grant Stewart (30)
3. Oli Kebble (45)
4. Rob Harley (228)
5. Tim Swinson (134)
6. Leone Nakarawa (71)
7. Callum Gibbins (C) (45)
8. Ryan Wilson (166)

9. Jamie Dobie (6)
10. Pete Horne (166)
11. Ratu Tagive (10)
12. Nick Grigg (67)
13. Huw Jones (33)
14. Tommy Seymour (141)
15. Glenn Bryce (28)

Replacements

16. Mesu Dolokoto (1)
17. Alex Allan (101)
18. Ewan Mcquillin (0)
19. Andrew Davidson (6)
20. Chris Fusaro (177)
21. Nick Frisby (20)
22. Ruaridh Jackson (161)
23. Niko Matawalu (125)

Injured: Adam Ashe (calf), Bruce Flockhart (back), Jonny Gray (hand), Siua Halanukonuka (calf), Kiran McDonald (hip), Stafford McDowall (Calf), Robbie Nairn (knee), D’arcy Rae (hand), Adam Nicol (calf), Jale Vakalaloma (shoulder), DTH van der Merwe (foot)

Three injured TH's and one away on international duty. Ewan McQuillin gets a shot at professional rugby. I hope it goes well for him, he must have been doing alright in the Super Six. On the other hand, not one injured LH.

Nakarawa instead of Harley at BS is an interesting call.

Dobie gets a babysitter with Peter Horne and what is overall a highly experienced side. Happy to see him, Tagive and Stewart get starts. Three of the front five subs have little experience at this level so hopefully we can get on top early and take the game away from the Dragons.

Super Ollie Griffiths is back for us, at least until someone in the crowd pulls out some kryptonite and he gets injured.

Anyone watch this....?

Saw the score. Dobie got MoM which is great. He could be pushing for a bench spot. Horne starting, Dobie on bench would be .

Watched the game on and off.

Kebble lucky not to have been sent off for slapping the opposition TH after Kebble had been pinned to the ground with an elbow in his face. Both got yellows and Glasgow retained the penalty. Not sure if he will face disciplinary for it.

Scrum was hit or miss for both sides as was the line-out but the latter was due to the wind. The maul was excellent including a try from a maul that started on the outside of the 22 line.

Aki Seulli had an outrageous offload to Tagive who had a sprint to the line only to be knocked out of play before he could get the ball down. Had the ball in his right hand going to the left corner so could not extend and was clearly knocked out. Small things that require work.

Nakarawa had to go off after his leg was hit awkwardly around the half hour mark. Hoping it was precautionary as he was able to walk off but it was not good.

Grigg had a good game and Huw Jones got a team try. The backs came into it more in the second half playing against the wind. It changed the Glasgow mindset clearly from wanting territory through kicking to using quick hands and they were able to manipulate the Dragons almost at will.

Dobie was good, not sure if he was MOTM. Plenty of potential shown and certainly a big improvement on Frisbee. Frisbee came on with Glasgow up by a couple of scores and gets charged down for a Dragons try letting them back into the game before Glasgow got a try with 5 or so minutes to go to end the game. Frisbee was brought in as a former international on probably a decent packet and it is clear that he is the fourth SH to close the season.

Hazel Sapling wrote:Watched the game on and off.

Kebble lucky not to have been sent off for slapping the opposition TH after Kebble had been pinned to the ground with an elbow in his face. Both got yellows and Glasgow retained the penalty. Not sure if he will face disciplinary for it. .

He ought to. Dean Ryan wasn’t happy with it and it cost Dragons 7 points too. Also, the stealing of a scrum free kick was terrible too, particularly when certain nationalities like to mention things like Byrne diving still etc.

Well done Dragons for going there and battling.

RiscaGame wrote:

Hazel Sapling wrote:Watched the game on and off.

Kebble lucky not to have been sent off for slapping the opposition TH after Kebble had been pinned to the ground with an elbow in his face. Both got yellows and Glasgow retained the penalty. Not sure if he will face disciplinary for it. .

He ought to. Dean Ryan wasn’t happy with it and it cost Dragons 7 points too. Also, the stealing of a scrum free kick was terrible too, particularly when certain nationalities like to mention things like Byrne diving still etc.

Well done Dragons for going there and battling.

Do you really think he is the first player in history to do that? It probably happens to some extent every second scrum - it just ended up being pretty blatant with Allan.

I liked Hazel's summing up: pretty accurate except for two points. Firstly the House Elf is the real deal;if he is managed properly he could become the next Mike Blair. Secondly, we saw probably the most surral replacement ever....Big uncle Naknaks went off to be replaced by Fozzie, probably the smallest forward at the club.
Finally Chuckles may not be smiling today; Turner was excellent last week and Stewart and DoubleD scored a hat trick between them while also giving very good all round performances. Chuckles may well miss the France match with Rambo starting and Turner at 16 and then find he's struggling to get back into the Warriors 23.