Newport Gwent Dragons v Aviron Bayonnais

The Dragons team to face Aviron Bayonnais:

Tom Prydie, Will Harries, Adam Hughes, Andy Tuilagi, Tonderai Chavhanga, Lewis Robling, Jonathan Evans, Owen Evans, Steve Jones, Nathan Buck, Ian Nimmo, Rob Sidoli, Tom Brown, Lewis Evans (c), Toby Faletau.

Replacements;
Sam Parry, Nathan Williams, Dan Way, Adam Jones, Jevon Groves, Liam Davies, Steffan Jones, Pat Leach.

and Bayonne:

1. Iguiniz
2. Roumieu
3. Tialata
4. Boutaty
5. Chisholm
6. Marmouyet
7. Haare
8. Puricelli
9. M.Phillips
10. Boyet
11. O'Connor
12. Lovobalavu
13. Lacroix
14. Gerber (ou Rokoçoko)
15. Spedding

Remplaçants: Da Ros, Lafont, Manukula, Linde, Baget, C.Garcia, Ugalde, Heymans.


Really happy with that centre pairing, and can't wait to see Tondi back - as long as we use him properly and work him into some space. But if we struggled against the Scarlets and Samson Lee, I don't know how we'll fare against Bayonne and Neemia Tialata...

Why oh why couldn't we have put that team out against Wasps? We were well beaten by Wasps, but the fact we scored so many points by playing so badly suggests that a full team would have done better, and may even have got a win.

Griff wrote:Why oh why couldn't we have put that team out against Wasps? We were well beaten by Wasps, but the fact we scored so many points by playing so badly suggests that a full team would have done better, and may even have got a win.

It's very annoying aye. Good of Rob Beale to say we didn't get the result we wanted last week mind. We didn't exactly go all out for it from the start did we.

Anyway, good team, but our scrum is in for a tuning I think.

Has anyone seen Bayonne play this season?

Bayonne were not doing well at the end of last season, I think it may be the same this season. Their team is a lot better on paper than I thought though. Would have preferred Jones to start at 10. IS Dan Evans injured?

Yes he is. Out for two weeks with his busted thumb. Back for Glasgow away on 2nd Nov.

I don't know why Steff isn't starting either. He's been playing well too. Part of me thinks Darren Edwards is trying to justify some of his selections from last week (Robling and Tom Brown at 6).

We have beaten them 50 3 before but I don't remember much about the match

When did we do that?

2006!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_union/my_club/ng_dragons/6053592.stm

Hercus, Sweeney and Emerick

Must have been a bad day at the office for Bayonne. Wouldn't complain if there's the same score tomorrow though.

Surely this is the side that should have faced Wasps last week, what is Edwards upto?

He doesnt even know, how should we ?

Risca Rev wrote:I don't know why Steff isn't starting either. He's been playing well too. Part of me thinks Darren Edwards is trying to justify some of his selections from last week (Robling and Tom Brown at 6).

I think there's a lot of truth in that.

Morgannwg wrote:Bayonne were not doing well at the end of last season, I think it may be the same this season. Their team is a lot better on paper than I thought though. Would have preferred Jones to start at 10. IS Dan Evans injured?

good summary. bayonne has great players on paper but mainly ones close to retirement like Tialata, Rokoçoko and heymans who are not very effective nowadays. their key players are boyet (when on form), chisholm as he's natural leader (on and off field) , the young winger o'connor and obviously Phillips when he's bothered. they have a good pack and tend to grind out wins at best. their T14 debut has been poor as usual and just only managed to win their local derby against biarritz which might be a turning point. am not really sure they will put a lot of efforts in the AC really but at least they are coming with their best available players so who knows.

Merci, whocares. But this is bad news for us:

whocares wrote:they have a good pack and tend to grind out wins

Luckless Pedestrian wrote:Merci, whocares. But this is bad news for us:

whocares wrote:they have a good pack and tend to grind out wins

last year you managed to beat perpignan who also had a good front five so no reason to be scared by bayonne...
last year you had charteris mind...

Is was a good win against Perpignan, too - not James Hook's finest game!

I thought Hook played well, the rest of the back line were poor, they moved Hook to centre as they had another decent fly half on the bench to replace the starting centre.

Edwards is making it clear he is only targeting the home games, the French teams seam to do the same i.e., win in front of the home crowd.

glamorganalun wrote:I thought Hook played well, the rest of the back line were poor, they moved Hook to centre as they had another decent fly half on the bench to replace the starting centre.

Edwards is making it clear he is only targeting the home games, the French teams seam to do the same i.e., win in front of the home crowd.

Edwards tried that logic v Cardiff Blues. That's why I would prefer he didn't do that.

Targeting the home games is one thing but what happened to notion of getting a run of games, building partnerships', getting match fitness, etc. These principles have been around in sport for a long time and still hold true. At this early stage of the season the best team needs to be given a chance to grow and bond together and get set plays working through familiarity and real time matchday experience. Chopping and changing all the time just interrupts that process IMO.

Yes, give the 'stars' a rest later on in the season or for a lower league game, or if you make the knockout stages of a cup then rest them in the league the week before the cup game, but if memory serves we rotated in our second game of the season away to Leinster, then rested players for the opening european cup game. Where's the continuity? This team will run out at Rodney Parade having not played together for a while. Not the best preparation IMO.

I can't argue with any of that, Griff. But what do we know about management?

glamorganalun wrote:I thought Hook played well, the rest of the back line were poor, they moved Hook to centre as they had another decent fly half on the bench to replace the starting centre.

Your memory might be better than mine, Alun, but I remember a few kicks out on the full for starters. He gave us a fair few reasons to cheer ironically...

N.B. I'm a big fan of Hook.

Well lets hope its not same as last week after scoring first again.

Handling letting us down.

Ref isnt though

DOD wrote:Ref isnt though

zzzzzzzzzzzz

DOD wrote:Ref isnt though

Biased in our favour? Or spotting Bayonne infringements which had to be the fault of the Dragons because Bayonne could not have made those mistakes, the awesome team that they are?

or maybe its 50-50 decisions viewed more in favour of the home/british team by the english/british ref....no surprise there then

And I take your view is that the poor Irish are left our of some sort of 'British love in?'

Prydie playing well as usual. This is the first time he's slotted into the full back role tonight as far as I know. He HAS to be in the Wales squad for the AI's.

Fittie in the crowd. Swear I recognise them two from somewhere...

Clear home decision there...terrible

Phillips looks awfull.

Dragons backline look so lightweight defencively, Prydie showing the only defencive quality there, Tuilagis turning like an oil tanker and everyone else is bouncing off tackles.

Defence isn't good. Nowhere near quick enough. It's giving the French a lot of space and they use it well every time. That said, Dragons should be further ahead but execution was not good enough.

amazing gave a penalty for Bayonne...probably reckoned he had to.

Two in a row...

DOD, your opinion is as valid as anyone's. But your Leinster boys have been accused of having/gaining the home advantage from refs in the past, including British ones. Not sure what the 'British' comment was about? And not sure why you're on here trying to stir things up. Unless..... Yes, let me guess. A nasty welsh person posted something you didn't like on 'your' Irish thread. That'll be it. Pay back. Like back in school. Excellent.

Watching this on S4C. Didn't rate Arthur Emyr as a player, but I swear that he's even worse commentatong!

Griff

Don't waste your time mate he's trolling every thread on here to get peoples backs up, ignore the pl4nk.

DOD is a Munsterman from Cork. He bet his house on Munster beating Leinster in the European semi-final back in 2009. Think Leinster ran out 23-6 winners?

It's a silly ten points we conceded near HT. We've played well till then.

Homer ref? He's missing them in at the side and everything.

Our defence is iffy yeah. We need to just go for the man with the ball really. Letting them run at us is asking for trouble.

Dragons started ok but one offload and linebreak and they all seem to be questioning the defencive system. They just need to reset and get aggressive, believe it'll work and not be so passive!!!

Hi Rev. Aren't you spending your wedding anniversary freezing your jubblies off in the hazell terrace with a pint?

I'm guessing the missus put the smack down and he's in the toilets of the Celtic Manor watching on his Iphone Morg

DOD, if you're not a Leinster fan then my apologies. If you are a Munster fan as suggested then that explains everything.

Very poor decision not to give holding on there but Buck was moronic!!!!

That should have been a penalty to us for holding on like... Wonder if he purposely made the wrong call because of his passport. Oh well, not they're ahead thanks to that.

Terrible how they yet again just wasted that. Little chip ahead by Prydie would have been fine.

I count 4/5 breaks now that were simple try scoring opportunities, the latest one highlights the weakness in Tobys game, catching a god damn ball

Jones should have been on for Robling 10 mins ago.

Dragons are starting to lose the plot here, looking shaky and I can't see them producing the goods to win it, but concede a pen to lose it!!!