01 Oct 2015, 19:27#1
They have made 7 changes to what was obviously their strongest side. There is talk of this being their plan all along, but it seems they would be quite happy not to face a motivated and strong Bok team.
It seems everyone wants to go through to the next round, but nobody wants to top the group.
MDMonkey D Luffy
Pro6,277 posts
MDMonkey D LuffyPro6,277 posts
01 Oct 2015, 19:55#2
i believe the talk about this being their plan all along.
the anomaly of the biggest upset in world rugby known as the cherry blossoms win over the Boks is something no one predicted.
Boks would have been favourites to top the pool at the beginning of the tournament, so its logical for the bravehearts to target the smaoa, japan and usa test matches and fielding as strong a team as possible against them.
the need to rest important key players before finals time means resting the players vs the Boks is the smart and most efficient way to proceed.
for a team like scotland, making the finals will be regarded as a successful RWC campaign, and if they can make the semis, than the streets of glasgow will be the most festive streets in the world,
CLclevermike
Coach57,555 posts
CLclevermikeCoach57,555 posts
02 Oct 2015, 06:19#3
bluebok
I am not so sure about the second-string players Scotland is using in their team. They have a lot of very new/inexperienced players in their team - so lets look at the team itself in more detail:-
15 Stuart Hogg, 14 Tommy Seymour, 13 Richie Vernon, 12 Peter Horne, 11 Tim Visser, 10 Duncan Weir, 9 Greig Laidlaw (c), 8 Dave Denton, 7 Blair Cowan, 6 Josh Strauss, 5 Jonny Gray, 4 Richie Gray, 3 WP Nel, 2 Fraser Brown, 1 Gordon Reid.
Replacements: 16 Ross Ford, 17 Alasdair Di ckinson, 18 Jon Welsh, 19 Tim Swinson, 20 Ryan Wilson, 21 Sam Hidalgo-Clyne, 22 Peter Horne, 23 Sean Lamont
There are in fact only two players who has not played any rugby for Scotland in the tournament thus far and I have highlighted them above. In essence I am still not convinced that this is not the strongest potential team they have available.
KMKa Mate
Club Pro246 posts
02 Oct 2015, 11:14#5
Not sure what the problem is here. Most teams rest their best players when they play the minnow teams. Why is it a problem when Scotland pick their B team to play the hopeless losers who lost to Japan?
02 Oct 2015, 11:19#6
Good one Ka Mate! We were resting our best players against Japan, our coach just didn't know it!
