Cooney. Baloucoune. Stockdale. McCloskey. All injured last week by the brutal Weegiegibbons. This means Ulster are starting nineteen-year-old Nathan Doak at scrum-half. Good luck to the lad!
Today’s picture was inspired by today’s walkies, where we ran across an enormous Doberman carrying a rugby ball in his mouth (a real ball, not a toy as in this pic). Owner hastily explained that Dobie had ‘found’ the ball and there was not a crying child somewhere.
My own dug was enormously impressed and tried her best to get him to do a bit of rough-and-tumble, but he was disdainful. Or was not going to be fooled into dropping the ball.
Onna telly this week
Friday 1st October
| Scarlets v Lions | 19:35 | BBC2 Wales / Premier Sports 2 |
| Connacht v Bulls | 19:35 | TG4 / Premier Sports 1 |
| Bristol v Bath | 19:45 | BT Sport 1 |
Saturday 2nd October
| Argentina v Australia | 08:05 | Sky Sports Main Event |
| South Africa v New Zealand | 11:05 | Sky Sports Mix |
| Treviso v Edinburgh | 13:00 | Premier Sports 1 |
| Lyon v Bordeaux | 14:00 | Premier Sports 2 |
| Leicester v Saracens | 15:00 | BT Sport 3 |
| Glasgow v Sharks | 15:00 | Premier Sports 1 |
| Biarritz v Toulouse | 16:00 | FreeSports |
| Zebre v Ulster | 17:15 | Premier Sports 2 |
| Ospreys v Cardiff | 19:35 | Premier Sports 1 |
| Munster v Stormers | 19:35 | RTÉ / Premier Sports 2 |
| Castres v Toulon | 20:05 | FreeSports |
Sunday 3rd October
| Dragons v Leinster | 14:00 | S4C / RTÉ2 / Premier Sports 1 | ||
| Sale v Exeter | 15:00 | BT Sport 1 | ||
| Clermont v Racing 92 | 20:05 | FreeSports |
Ovally Balls 
I seem to remember Jaco van der Walt was quite good in his debut (only?) international.
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Well he was being benchmarked against Finn Russell so he probably looked steady enough.
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Belgium-France has so far veered between the tedious and outrageous. But mostly very skillful. Wouldn’t be watching other than a highveld thunderstorm has exploded all of a sudden, with thunder and lightning and hail and heavy rain, so no chance of sleeping!
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Belgium on attack are fabulous. They go from knocking it about to deadly in seconds. The awareness, pace and accuracy is wonderful to watch.
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2-0 up against France at half time. And that’s me for the evening.
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Deebs leaves, France score 3.
Deebs not welcome in Belgium anymore.
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There we go then.
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#thepowerofdeebs
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Frankie sings, the power of Deebs.
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Wellington blow a 17-3 lead after 20 minutes against Canterbury and the match finishes 30-30 at full time. They’re now going into extra time, although I have no idea what the format is. Oh. Wellington get the ball from the kick off, go through about five phases and score in the corner. All over. So golden score.
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“I seem to remember Jaco van der Walt was quite good in his debut (only?) international.”
He was steady and had a decent game, we’ve actually a few unfancied guys come in to the Scotland side and do a job, Daryl Marfo, Luke Hamilton, Nick Haining to name three.
I’d never write what I did if I thought there was any chance of Jaco vd Walt reading it, these guys are humans first, I don’t like social media pile-ons, during a game it’s kind of ok in the heat of the moment, but not afterwards.
I’ll recant a bit and point out that he’s been leading the points scoring tallies a few times in the Pro Woo, he has shown glimpses that there is a creative player in there, but as a dilapidated ex-forward it’s still galling to see your fly half miss touch, it’s evident that even opposition supporters remember incidents of it (Trisk).
Not only does it turn the momentum of a game at that point, it also means that if the opposition coaches have it in the back of their minds that the kicker is flaky, it might mean they encourage their players to go after that 40-60 turnover opportunity when the posts are out of range.
Having said that , it wasn’t Jaco that botched the lineout on 80 mins that led to the drop goal winner four and a half minutes later.
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‘these guys are humans first’
Mostly yes. There are a few I’d like to see some evidence for.
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What was it Sag used to say?
Orcs on dinosaur backs, or something.
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Mutants I think it was.
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As opposed to orcs that is. The dinosaurs were definitely involved.
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Would be nice to have Sag’s take on this too:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/oct/08/chinas-noisy-dancing-grannies-silenced-by-device-that-disables-speakers
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I read this week that it is said by insiders that LOTR Orcs were modelled on Harvey Weinstein……………………………..
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jaco alert. Embra to face the stormers
15. Henry Immelman (2)
14. Darcy Graham (41)
13. James Lang (2)
12. Cammy Hutchison (3)
11. Ramiro Moyano*
10. Jaco van der Walt (73)
9. Ben Vellacott (2)
1. Pierre Schoeman (67)
2. Dave Cherry (38)
3. Luan de Bruin*
4. Marshall Sykes (9)
5. Grant Gilchrist (161) CAPTAIN
6. Jamie Ritchie (79)
7. Luke Crosbie (60)
8. Viliame Mata (91)
Replacements: 16. Adam McBurney* 17. Boan Venter (9) 18. WP Nel (158) 19. Jamie Hodgson (25) 20. Magnus Bradbury (95) 21. Charlie Shiel (37) 22. James Johnstone (66) 23. Damien Hoyland (85)
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I saw that too, Slade, funny if true.
Kinghorn is on the injured list still, not a lot of faith being shown in Savala or Chamberlain unfortunately
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“your” Exeter team to face Worcester:
Hogg, Cordero, Slade, Hendrickson, O’Flaherty
Skinner, Maunder
Hepburn, LC-D, Williams
Witty, Hill
Ewers, Capstick, Simmonds
Innard, Keast, Josepha-Scott, Skinner, Tshiunza, H-Clyne, Simmonds, Whitten
LC-D, Hill and SImmonds added back this week -good.
Exeter to win.
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The lads I’m going to be watching tomorrow:
15. Jimmy O’Brien 14. Adam Byrne 13. Jamie Osborne 12. Ciarán Frawley 11. Jordan Larmour 10. Harry Byrne 9. Luke McGrath
1. Ed Byrne 2. Seán Cronin 3. Michael Ala’alatoa 4. Devin Toner 5. Ryan Baird 6. Dan Leavy 7. Scott Penny 8. Rhys Ruddock
Replacements: 16. Rónan Kelleher 17. Peter Dooley 18. Cian Healy 19. Ross Molony 20. Max Deegan 21. Nick McCarthy 22. Johnny Sexton 23. Rob Russell
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Gloucester Rugby
15. Jason Woodward
14. Louis Rees-Zammit *
13. Chris Harris
12. Mark Atkinson
11. Jonny May *
10. Adam Hastings
9. Ben Meehan
1. Harry Elrington
2. Jack Singleton
3. Kirill Gotovtsev
4. Freddie Clarke *
5. Andrew Davidson
6. Ruan Ackermann
7. Lewis Ludlow (c) *
8. Ben Morgan
16. Matt Moulds
17. Val Rapava-Ruskin
18. Jamal Ford-Robinson
19. Matias Alemanno
20. Jack Clement *
21. Charlie Chapman *
22. Billy Twelvetrees
23. Kyle Moyle
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Saw my first Christmas product in the shop earlier. Normally I’d complain but you can’t with these babies:
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WRONG Taytos taste of wrongness!
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Just got Night Boat to Tangiers today, btw. I’ll let you know what I think!
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New post inna minute….
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New post.
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