The reason BOD was dropped

First topic message reminder :

Many people are saying hes played poorly, hes paid the price for lack of attacking impetus, hes no longer a force to be reckoned with etc etc

I dont think this is true. Firstly, he hasnt been "poor". But neither has his form merited him undroppable. Hes been excellent in defence and in attack hes been fairly ananamymous. But this is the case with the Lions in general. Some are making him out as the scapegoat. I cant agree. The Lions lack of attacking success starts far earlier than BOD. The pack have not enjoyed nearly the kind of dominance expected. Ball has been slow. The set peice has creaked. The distribution to Sexton is poor. In short, there is no platform or go forward which largely lies with the pack and hasnt been helped by Philips in particular who was poor in the first test. Few Lions have stood out as performing particularly well. Gatlands gameplan wasnt hard to spot and relied on smashing the Aussies with a pack and set peice that was expected to dominate. It hasnt happened at the whole team has been misfiring as a result. BOD hasnt played amazingly, but his function has been largely a defensive one thanks to the way the games have panned out. Hes performed that well.

Next, it is probably incorrectly assumed that BOD was a shoe in for Gatland anyway. His position in the team selected itself thanks to injury concerns and now that there is full compliment of centres available hes been left out. I think people are wrongly assuming its because hes played poorly. He maybe was never an automatic to begin with and Gatland might well have favoured his Welsh pairing with whom he is more familiar with anyway. Now that the pressure is really on, Gatland has retreated back into what he is most familiar with. Trying to overpower the Aussies with a Welsh oriented Lions squad. My concern is it conservative and history suggests both that it hasnt worked in the past and that the Aussies are familiar with it now.

Its difficut to be ambitious on a Lions tour with limited game time and the natural tendancy is to stick with what you know. History suggests a tightish game that Australia will win. BOD is most likely just a casualty of Gatlands overall strategy rather than a player dropped for being poor or past it. To be honest, the Lions play and set up is in its coaches image and Gatland is persisting with the same kind of approach he has thrown at the Aussies time and time again. Other than the Warratahs game, the Lions have been largely unimpressive and their gameplan has failed this far but thanks to fortunate circumstances in the first test where they nicked a win, and a quality goalkicker they are still in the series.

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GunsGerms wrote:I think thats the Mills and Boon version Fly is it?

That is fecking hilarious  

Yeah, Guns seems to have a continuing and suppressed real 'soft spot' for me...which I'm getting uneasy about, to be honest.  Must remember to slide along walls more

I'm afraid I love the ladies.... 

 

I feel your pain Fly - Believe you me I have been there and its a lonely place particularly when no one understands it. I've said on so many occasions (probably every week to certain individuals) - "If ignorance is bliss then what's at the other end of the spectrum - it can only be bleak surely - It will pass in time and our tortured minds will return to their default position and our insanity will find a better place to rest

After being forced to actually look at the smorgasbords of BODs vs JD's around the world I have to agree JD's efforts were on the pathetic side, particularly with the AAC try. BOD tracked and got his man perfectly.JD's positioning was weak and he was slow to take up BOD's excellent line.

BOD took his man comfortably 5 meteres from the line and JD opened the door that BOD had firmly closed. Simple as that. Cant see why there needs to be all this analysis. So hard done by selection wise? Probably. Gats obviously faults BODs side of the 'pairing' more than JD for some reason. Still doesnt warrant the outrage.

A statement based on fact is still welcome, Taylor, all the same.  They're thin on the ground.  
But we discuss things here because it's a forum.  Gotta talk about something and the controversy issues are the juiciest.


But just a little thought experiment to get you in the loop.  There exists a SH Lions side (NZ, AUS, SA, Argentina).  Heyneke Meyer coaches.  He isn't having as good a test series as he expected.  Systems are confused, patterns aren't working, NZ style isn't merging to SA tactics.  McCaw is having an okay tour but not really getting into his groove.  But still confident he's doing enough in the limited gameplan to keep his position for the final decider.  But nope, Meyer says the side isn't balancing up and in order to make things operate more smoothly he needs to be dropped.  Not to the bench just cut completely.  

Now, baring in mind that NZers aren't happy with the SA tactics in the first place, and are blaming the tactics for painting players in a bad light...., just what do you think the reaction of the NZ public would be?  And press?  I know what I'd expect....

Understand the scenario...the main difference being that the selection of players comes from the top 3 odd sides. Assuming a SH side would, like the Lions, be better than the best individual side- NZ at the moment. Then the opposition would be against a side vs those not in the top 3 odd.. it suggests the side would be too good for whatever the opposition is.

For that reason I don't think it would work. Chances are such a side would end up not finding opponents that want to play them, it would be that strong.

So whether a SH side would actually find itself in the position that the Lions frequently face, is doubtful at best. But should it happen I agree it would cause friction as for one Kiwi's are still in that no loss is acceptable mode and if such a side were to lose due to reasons it has no control over we'd probably disown it to be honest.

Taylorman wrote:After being forced to actually look at the smorgasbords of BODs vs JD's around the world I have to agree JD's efforts were on the pathetic side, particularly with the AAC try. BOD tracked and got his man perfectly.JD's positioning was weak and he was slow to take up BOD's excellent line.

BOD took his man comfortably 5 meteres from the line and JD opened the door that BOD had firmly closed. Simple as that. Cant see why there needs to be all this analysis. So hard done by selection wise? Probably. Gats obviously faults BODs side of the 'pairing' more than JD for some reason. Still doesnt warrant the outrage.

Spot on Taylorman..but you'll have to excuse the outrage, we Irish need our heroes... BOD is very important to our national moral, especially so since Roy Keane turned out to be a sociopath, Bono a tax dodger and Ronan Keating did the dirty in Yvonne.

Daniel O'Donnell and BOD are all we have left.

Pity Daniel died on the battlements of the Alamo, he could fair toot a tune, that lad. He's sorely missed but Americay needed him more than we did.

rodders wrote:Roy Keane turned out to be a sociopath, Bono a tax dodger and Ronan Keating did the dirty in Yvonne.

If only he'd worn protection.

Taylorman wrote:Understand the scenario...the main difference being that the selection of players comes from the top 3 odd sides. Assuming a SH side would, like the Lions, be better than the best individual side- NZ at the moment. Then the opposition would be against a side vs those not in the top 3 odd.. it suggests the side would be too good for whatever the opposition is.

This is the "doubtful at best" part - a scratch collection of individuals against a settled side isn't necessarily better, just look at the Barbarians. Rugby is supposed to be the ultimate team game, and teams take a looong time learning how to perform.

I just hope the Lions win today to complete BOD's career so he finally gets his Lions series win, he has added a lot to the team and played two complete games. The team is 23 players not one single player.

Good luck the Lions and BOD will be behind the "team".

Rodders, you have still have Graham Norton and Terry Wogan.



.....................backs away slowly

The impression I had was that Gatland wanted Jamie Roberts to play 12 and was trying to work out who would fit best with him at 13.

Yup and he got it spot on so fair play. Brian is a legend and still a quality player but a new generation is here.

I still believe we'd have won today with him on the pitch but Davies had a fine game and justified his selection.

The real difference was Corbiesero and Roberts though. O'Brien added a lot to the back row though.

SOB showed that he should have played all 3 tests.

Rodders concur with you....however would have been nice to see BOD with go forward ball via a dominate pack instead of the shambles he was forced to play behind last week.

So fair play to JD as he had a good game but I still believe that BOD would have brought more particularly with the dominate pack in front of him....but then again does it matter to most now?  Series won is a series won

Yeah Fergus I totally agree. I would love to have seen BOD play - both from the perspective of seeing him lead the lions to victory, a fitting way for such and icon to bow out, and because we'd have seen much more of him in attack today, especially alongside Roberts.

It wasn't to be though, he can still take pride in the role he played albeit not as central as he'd have liked.

Ultimately its a team game and the series was won - everything else is just a side show to that.

Such a dominat pack with a complete lightweight like Parling at 5....................emmmmm. Do some people need to start eating their words.

Corbs was fantastic today, showed why the English hold him such high regard.

I thought the whole back row was good, even Lydiate did more than mow legs.

Only failure was Philips, slow, dismal passing and had learned nothing from T1.

Why has 1/2p not joined the line like that before, he was the missing link that the Lions had been looking like. If I wanted to really wum, I would say he looked like an English fullback joining the line. But I won't because has has always done that for Wales, just noy for the Lions in T1 and T2.

Nice to see a Scot finaly get on the field, it's only stats, but at least all 4 nations ended up with a cap.