oggy123 wrote:
Completely disagree with you there... Drinkwater played to a structure imo.. We need someone too take on the line.. All Catalans did was stack it up the middle and then slide following the ball... We need someone who can take on the line with pace too stop that slide or else no matter what pack you have you aren't gonna beat anyone up the middle
What I watched (especially the 2nd half) was Walsh pushing players into position, he moved himself to 2nd receiver and then you had him and the scrum half in the backline. They probed with 2 dummy runners and nearly got it through to Horo. Few plays later they ran the same move, but this time Fleming worried he was about to get beaten on the inside by the pass to Horo got stuck in no-mans land and they got the 2 on 1 and scored. That for me was all down to Walsh organising the play, moving to 2nd receiver he could pass quickly and set off what was clearly an organised move.
Yes Cats play a lot of straight down the middle rugby, but when they wanted to they executed very slick passing moves and scored for the most part. Walsh was at the forefront of everything good they did going forward.
I just dont think Drinkwater is good enough personally, you can look at an aging pack, you can look at the guys outside him not being good enough, you can say he isnt being given the structure from the coaches, but ultimately we looked devoid of any sort of direction going forward, it was all the same play over and over. Stick Riddy in vs Cats I think the team overall performs better.