And we’re back…
Oh, goody! A controversy to begin with. (Where ‘controversy’ has its modern meaning of ‘a confected talking point hyped up by media companies desperate for eyeballs’.) My take? The Gloucester player knocked the ball on (sorry, forward – it’s not called “knock-on” any more, apparently) in the tackle1. Controversial, eh?
Moving on…
There have been a lot of words coming out of the coaching team about a change in style this season – about wanting to be more expansive and adventurous. On the evidence of the first ten minutes of this match, I believe them.
Unfortunately, the evidence of the first forty minutes was that ‘expansive and adventurous’ also includes ‘overeager and headstrong’. It felt as if they were trying too hard to—as it were—“do a Bristol”.
We saw a lot of hustle and bustle and flinging the ball around, but if there was a plan to it all, then it certainly didn’t survive first contact with the enemy. The team showed a welcome willingness to get the ball wide, but this was happening before the space was there to make it effective. And so, we did lots of sideways movement, but not so much forward.
Which was a pity, because Gloucester were, frankly, quite poor. We left several scores out there through… I suppose a failure to play what was in front of them, an unstructured style that was simply not working. I think there were two close-range maul tries that weren’t – one of them looked from my position to have taken some real skill to fail to score.
Roebuck’s try was scant reward for so much first-half dominance, especially in the set-piece. Much had been made of the size (and England prospects) of their tighthead, Fasogbon. And, looking at him standing next to Bev, you’d be forgiven for thinking that it was an unequal match-up. It was, but not that way. Those of us who’ve followed Bev know that a bigger opponent is easier to get underneath. So it was that, again, to no Sale fan’s surprise, Sale’s scrum dominated Gloucester’s.
The full extent to which Bev must have wound Fasogbon up became apparent when Gloucester finally won a scrum penalty at the end of the half, and Fasogbon stood up looking as if he’d just won World War III and was ready to make a start on World War IV. I wasn’t surprised that he was “tactically substituted” at half-time: if he’d stayed on, I’m pretty sure he’d have started a fight and been sent off.
Points to Bev, there…
Minus a few points from the defence following that penalty, though, as they seemed to switch off and gift Gloucester a lead at the break that they in no way deserved.
I’m assuming the Words Were Said during the interval, since Sale’s tactics changed quite dramatically after the restart. The passing was now a lot more purposeful, and you could see that they were trying to pull the defence around and create gaps to be exploited.
We also started to revert more and more to box kicking as the game progressed (Kicks ’Я’ Gus). Understandable, I feel: we have a couple of potent weapons in Buck and Flats, so why not make use of them? The issue comes with overuse of the kick: get the balance right, and we can be hard to live with.
Anyway, we take the game to Gloucester and, ten minutes into the half, they lose Clement to the bin. Six minutes later, Jibs scores a hooker’s try. The conversion took us into a lead that we didn’t allow Gloucester to come anywhere near.
Sale continued to blow off the cobwebs and started to look more and more fluid until, with about ten minutes to go, their more structured passing game started to open up holes in the defence. A sublime pass from Ford to Carps put him through a gap the size of the Mersey tunnel for try number three.
It took until the seventy-ninth minute for the bonus point score, as yet another sublime pass from Ford out to Flats on the wing. He then passed it back in to Carps, who passed round another defender to Hyron, who had a couple of metres of open grass between him and the try line. Four tries, thoroughly deserved.
So, it took about fifty minutes to brush off the cobwebs, lubricate the gears and fire up the engine, but at least that’s better than taking five matches.
Yes, we looked rusty and off the game for a while, but the new intent is obvious, and I’m looking forward to seeing how the new coaching structure shapes up as the competition heats up.
Overall, we deserved the win, and I think we deserved the bonus point. Either Gloucester were having the sort of start that we usually have, or we managed to make them look a shadow of last season’s side. Maybe they miss Carreras more than they thought.
The next game’s going to be the big test, though; Bath away. The last couple of visits there, we’ve been there or thereabouts for about sixty minutes, but then seemed to fade away. I know they have a formidable side, but I think we can handle them if we’re on top form. They have several key players missing on Lions rest or with the Rugby Championship, a fact that I can bear with calm fortitude (especially considering who we were missing the last time they ventured up to Salford). This one could really lay down a marker…
Plaudits: I am rapidly becoming a big fan of Jibulu. A monster in the scrum and—importantly—bloody good darts. Bev, Jibs, Asher: a front row for the future and a long time to come (I hope).
Fordy played a blinder (again – do I really need to say it?). His passes for the last two tries were top-drawer stuff. Flats seems to have gained a new lease of life, Vermeulen is a monster (he played about sixty minutes with a grade 2 hamstring tear), and, as for Ernie… captaincy obviously suits him: he picked up from last season without missing a beat and seems to have a good attitude with the refs.
The predictor has us down for a five- to six-point defeat at Bath, but I think we are capable of defying that, on a good day, with a following wind.
Go well, lads…
1: For clarity:
- 11.2 It is a knock forward when a player, in tackling or attempting to tackle an opponent, makes contact with the ball and the ball goes forward.2
- 11.5 There is no sanction, and play continues, if:
- a. […]
- b. A player rips or knocks the ball from an opponent and the ball goes forward from the opponent’s hand or arm
2 I say ‘clarity’, but that wording is ambiguous. Is ‘forward’ relative to the tackler or the ball carrier? Or both? It’s only because I’ve seen ‘knock-on in the tackle’ go against the defender enough times that I can interpret this law as meaning ‘relative to the tackler’.
an old grey dog 