Enjoyed that. I suspect I'd have given up on the second half if I wasn't actually at the game, but it was gripping in the stand. With no great buy in for either side (an equal amount of not much). Great seats, row 11, closer to halfway than the 10m line, opposite side to the cameras. But thank fuck the rain stopped coz not under cover. A bit of mizzle in the first half, which counter-intuitively was the better half of rugby from where I was sitting. Crowd started to get a bit aggravated, particularly with BOK, as the beer vision took effect. Strange they couldn't see any fuck ups by the Reds ... Thought BOK was pretty good myself (although the yellow on Hodgman, not 100% sure what that was. Thought the maul had been sacked legally. Was it something else?) Loud pumping music was not as intrusive as previous experiences. +1 to the stadium. -1 was the lack if ANY announcement of the Force team, or their subs. There's two teams playing, keep us up to date. And tell us who scored the points. Sure hype the home team, but keep us informed. -1 again ... the lame attempts at entertainment and hype generation. Having said that the kids around were really into "WE ARE RED!", so what do I know? Suncorp is a great stadium for viewing. Need to go more often.

We just need to keep the playing group together. It'd be a shame to see Tangitau spend two years in Dunedin, Telea go overseas and him switch straight back into the Blues 14 jersey. There is a core of a really good team there. They are just very young. In comparison most weeks the other NZ teams can rely on All Blacks and other former internationals to provide direction. We, at the moment have guys 24 and under, then look at the long-termers who are the likes of DLB and Gilbert. Not big stage players. The ship will turnaround. Hopefully everything is putting place before Joseph decides he is refreshed and ready for international rugby again. Hoping there are a few guys coming through that will hopefully fill some gaps. Then we need to look at opportunities to pick up Super ready guys stuck behind All Blacks like Tangitau. Our average loss has been by four points. The reds one was against a side with 12 players with international experience. The Brumbies with about seven or eight. The same with the Tahs. Hurricanes with seven, I think too. It is a really hard competition. I think back to the teams where we had the likes of Gregory, Koroi, Paea, Dawai, Makalio. Where our tactics were throw it to Nareki, Gilbert and TUJ and hope. Gilbert has gone from a key player to someone who is more of a steady hand, and realistically a bit of a jack of all trades. We do have a bit of an issue with squad balance where we panic signed some young local lads and they aren't quite meeting the mark. While a significant number of our squad are learning their craft at this level. Instead of what would have been the case a decade ago, on a cold afternoon in the NPC. James Slipper and Allan Alaalatoa have played more than 200 tests for the Wallabies combined. That's a good set of Super Rugby book ends. The cogs are moving in the right direction. We desperately need continuity. As well as filling the gaps from the bottom up in the right places.

Beyond frustrating to lose that, but I’d argue that game has to give more positive heed for the long-term future than any this season. That backline (when you consider who is injured) is plenty good enough to win a Super Rugby title. We’re scoring some great tries… The loose forwards remain a work in progress, we’ll be looking for a big number eight, but thought Lasaqa and Withy were both outstanding. Best we’ve seen yet from Howden too. Could do with another lock, and some props, but this team will continue to get better. Big if, but if we keep hold of our current backs, sprinkle in Pledger & Tengbald + a few others, and this is a serious unit. For the rest of this season, I think we’re Scrooge mcduck realistically. Lost within 7 to the three Aussie sides, who probably all make the top six. You’re still alive on paper if you take down the Force and Drua, but this forward pack isn’t good enough I don’t think to hang over those last rounds… that said, somewhere along the line, with that backline, we’ll upset the applecart.

The Landers pretty much head to Australia with our season on the line I feel. If we can win 1/2, we come back to play the Drua, and should be able to square our record at 4 wins & 4 losses... that would leave some heavy lifting to do, with four games against the Chiefs & Crusaders in our last six, but we need to be beating these types of teams to make it in. You win two of those, take out Moana and it gets us to seven wins which is going to be the ballpark. If we can win both these games in Aussie, I think we are back on course for the playoffs. We're going to have to switch things up, but not sure we get many back this week... PROP: Assuming fitness, Kautai definitely starts - hoping he is okay, because whatever happens, Ma'u needs to be on the bench. Wingham is an even worse scrummager, so this could be a real issue. de Groot gets a kick up the ass, but I've enjoyed Bartlett's impact late in games, so wouldn't tweak that. HOOKER: Vikena was much better, but thought Taylor was disappointing. Bell should get a run, and I think they'd probably start him, before bringing Vikena on for the last 30 minutes? LOCK: Has to be Dunshea and Holland LOOSE FORWARD: Howden reverts to the blindside, and then it is a question of what to do with the rest of it. Withy at seven, I don't think starting a pair of opensides really works, so Lasaqa drops to the bench. The prognosis on Renton hasn't been very good for weeks, and supposedly it shows no signs of changing. I'd start Stodart, because simply put we need some size. The other option is stick with Broughton, but he has been underwhelming. HALVES: Fakatava comes straight back in. Hastie reverts to the bench. Robinson starts, and Millar comes back onto the bench, because Faleafaga seems incapable of directing a backline MIDFIELD: Jimmy moves back to 12, Tele'a has been strong but might be due a partial rest? TUJ was okay, so I'd lean to start him at 13, with Tele'a on the bench, but would be happy with the other way around too OUTSIDES: Tangitau is obviously on the right wing, but the rest feels challenging. In terms of guys who are match fit and available, there's Manson, Gilbert & Nareki. I'd go Nareki on the left and Manson at fullback, because Gilbert just isn't cutting it at the moment, but suspect it will be Gilbert in 15. I don't really see us winning, because our issues in the loose forwards and at fullback have reached breaking point, and we don't have the depth to counteract it. There was another loose forward looking player warming up last week, who was certainly bigger, but could not work out who it was. It didn't look like Tai Cribb, but I don't know who else is down here.

Round 3: The fight back Melbourne hold out a gutsy and determined Penrith who are suddenly 1-2. The Wahs beat the Roosters who are pretty shit, and obviously played out of their skin last week. The Cowboys showed up this week but still weren't good enough to beat the Broncos. Payne Haas is terrifying. Saturday Cronulla put Souths back in their box in a pretty one-sided affair. The Dolphins are in real trouble. They lead the Tigers 18-6 and went on to lose 18-30. The Tigers have had a nice soft start to the year, are definitely improved, and aren't giving up many points. The Knights too have had a soft start, and everyone expected them to pump the Titans. Except Tino is back and the Titans are different when he plays. Yesterday the Eels showed some fight against Bulldogs outfit stripped of 4 of its best players. And despite Lomax having a real go, they were terrible on attack, and the Doggies held on in a game that African Monkey accurately described. In the late game Manly took all their frustrations from last week out on a Raiders side who were horrible. It was 40-0 early enough for the 50 but Manly went easy. Haumole Olakau'atu is both huge and really good at football. Reece Walsh is once again getting a kicking for his ridiculous error count, but i tell you what, his opposite number from Friday is probably pretty happy that Reece has a higher profile, Drinkwater was dogshit. Again. The big boys are the stand out players to start the year. Guys like Haas, Tino, Olakau'atu, Utoikamanu and May have all started the year on fire and are driving their teams forward. This is good news for the Wahs who have a couple of really good ones. I saw the two worst penalties i have seen in a while this week. First Munster gets penalised for feeding it to Liam Martin after the two of them had been going at each other all game. Then yesterday Josh Curran got penalised for pretending to be the ref and calling Eels players off side. "Not in the spirit of the game" come the fuck on.

Playoff for 3rd and 4th was entertaining. Credit to all the teams playing 3 games over a week and looking better and better. Blues Front row and loosies were powerful. Not only the starters, but the bench forwards were immense. The hookers should pat each other on the back as they were awesome. Simpson was solid in the backs and led his team really well. Norrie looked fantastic with ball in hand. Made the midfield for the Canes look silly at times in broken play. Hurricanes Lets be fair, frontrow is not their strength. They really struggled against a physical Blues front row. Falloon in the second row was working hard but by far the best forward on the field was Berg-mclean playing 7. The smallest forward on the pitch and yet he must have had 5 or 6 pilfers and made a huge amount of tackles. Support play was superb as well. Tamati and Thompson were excellent in the halves. Really quick ball and used their outsides well. Midfield struggled on D. Solomon and Denyer, outstanding again for the Canes. These two have had a great tournament. Kennedy try was superb as well. Reserve halfback brought some energy off the bench.

On the Warriors That was a stirring win that, despite the score, was in the balance for far too long (or maybe thats just our PTSD talking). But you know what? There is the making of a decent side there. I still maintain that to really improve it is time to move CNK and CHT out of the team. This game was tailor made for CNK, a winnable game where the biggest thing was emotion, he feeds off that shit (see Penrith last year). But he is still a very average fullback. Tuapiki is completely wasted on the wing. So is Roger to be fair. CHT did absolutely fuck all on the weekend, Metcalfe was everything. Niukore and Capewell are bog average and need upgrades. But on the flip side Erin Clark made me a believer, he had a huge game, smashed in to everything, and if he can keep that up our starting middles are real good. Egan was back to his best, and Walker is so important off the bench for us. I think the young forwards need more time as well. That was a good win, but it wasn't really built on antyhing sustainable. Manly got complacent when it looked like they would just continue of from Week 1, and then when the error counted mounted, they couldn't switch back on, and we took advantage of repeated opportunities, a loud crowd, and the emotion of the occasion.