Zebre vs Edinburgh 24th October 2:30pm Somewhere in Italy

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Zebre vs Edinburgh

Date: 24th October
Kick-off: 2.30pm local time (1.30pm UK & Ireland)

Referee: Peter Fitzgibbon (IRFU,63rd competition game)
Assistant Referees: Elia Rizzo, Luca Trentin (both FIR)
Citing Commissioner: Achille Reali (FIR)
TMO: Carlo Damasco (FIR)

Venue: Stadio Sergio Lanfranchi

Live on RAI Sport

Interesting Fact: The stadium was named after Sergio Lanfranchi (1925-2001), an international rugby union prop from Parma who played for Italy from 1949 to 1961 (was he any good Jimbo?) and spent most of his club career in France.

Head to Head: Edinburgh are better

Record this season: Edinburgh are much better

fES predicted outcome: Edinburgh to win and remain higher than Glasgow in the league

Zebre player(s) to watch: Leonardo Sarto, Matteo Pratichetti and Dion Berryman

Edinburgh player(s) to watch: Anton Bressler, Hamish Watson, Nasi Manu, Phil Burleigh and Will Helu

Edinburgh Rugby team v Zebre

15 Jack Cuthbert
14 Tom Brown
13 Will Helu
12 Andries Strauss
11 Damien Hoyland
10 Phil Burleigh
9 Nathan Fowles

1 Rory Sutherland
2 Neil Cochrane
3 John Andress
4 Anton Bresler
5 Fraser McKenzie
6 Mike Coman (capt)
7 Hamish Watson
8 Nasi Manu

Substitutes
16 George Turner
17 Allan Dell
18 Simon Berghan
19 Alex Toolis
20 Cornell Du Preez
21 Sam Hidalgo-Clyne
22 Dougie Fife
23 Blair Kinghorn

I think they may be contenders, but that will all come from the forwards.

Assuming this is the top choice team:

9: SHC
10: Phil Burleigh
11: Will Helu
12: Matt Scott
13: Michael Allen
14: Damien Hoyland
15: Greig Tonks

Bar SHC and Scott, not one of the first choice players is international standard. We're not got a single specialist fly half and zero depth in the back 3 or centres.

I just don't understand how Solomons can keep buying forwards and not any half descent backs!

I suspect Solomons didn't have much say in the Hardie signing, although I'm sure he won't be complaining.

Reckon he is being paid for by the SRU instead of out of the Edinburgh budget (like Maitland was to start with)?

On the backs front, I think Burleigh is an international class 12 but not at 10. I'd say Tonks wouldn't disgrace himself at 15 for Scotland either if he was picked going forwward.

Will Helu was in every Tongan 23 at the world cup so he is a decent class player too.

And we all have high hopes for Hoyland.

We just need a 10...

It's a good pack from Solomons - loves his continuity doesn't he?

I get the feeling he's sending a message to Cornell Du Preez - buck up your ideas young man. He's a top quality forward and a better player than Coman but he sometimes gives the impression that he can't be arsed. I think Solomons is giving him some tough love.

I'm quite excited about Helu at 13, although like all players partnered with Strauss he'll have to find his own space to work with. I'm also pleased to see Hoyland continuing his run on the wing. This game should throw up some more opportunities for him to run in space - he's such an exciting player.

Well done to Blair Kinghorn on making the bench. Obviously a blow to lose both Tonks and RDW's Best Man to injury, but a great opportunity for Kinghorn should Solomons be able to give him 10 minutes at the end of the game.

Our pack should boss this, and Burleigh has enough class to get Helu and Hoyland into good positions. Tom Brown also rewarded for a fine performance against Ulster, and Cuthbert will be eager to get himself back in the XV after losing out to Tonks this season.

I think we'll win this, but have a sneaky suspicion we'll fall short of 4 tries.

I haven't seen enough of Allen or Helu (at centre) to think they're better than Beard, who I think is easily good enough for a good Pro12 team.

Edinburgh need a good season out of Hoyland. Whilst he looks like a prospect, I'm not sure if he can be relied on when you play the better teams.

Up front, it would be difficult to argue that you have the best pack in the league both in terms of starting 8 and subs.

Weegie Wizard wrote:
Up front, it would be difficult to argue that you have the best pack in the league both in terms of starting 8 and subs.

Assuming that isn't a typo, I'd say we'd certainly be in the top 4 for pack strength in the league at least. Our front row was one of the form units in the world cup, and completely obliterated a lot of teams last season, and our back row boasts real quality and depth. From memory we had the most successful lineout % last season, or one of the top ones at least, so our 2nd rows are pretty good too.

We don't have as much depth in the front row, but they are strong enough that we don't go from dominant to getting our arses handed to us when (if) they come off the bench. Young Sutherland is a future Scotland internationalist if he carries on his current trajectory. Gilchrist and Toolis both being injured at the same time is a blow, but Bresler and McKenzie outplayed their Ulster rivals last weekend.

It's not very often Edinburgh will play a team which has more saffer than them but here you go, 6 saffers in that Zebre starting lineup!

funnyExiledScot wrote:It's a good pack from Solomons - loves his continuity doesn't he?

I get the feeling he's sending a message to Cornell Du Preez - buck up your ideas young man. He's a top quality forward and a better player than Coman but he sometimes gives the impression that he can't be arsed. I think Solomons is giving him some tough love.

I'm quite excited about Helu at 13, although like all players partnered with Strauss he'll have to find his own space to work with. I'm also pleased to see Hoyland continuing his run on the wing. This game should throw up some more opportunities for him to run in space - he's such an exciting player.

Well done to Blair Kinghorn on making the bench. Obviously a blow to lose both Tonks and RDW's Best Man to injury, but a great opportunity for Kinghorn should Solomons be able to give him 10 minutes at the end of the game.

Our pack should boss this, and Burleigh has enough class to get Helu and Hoyland into good positions. Tom Brown also rewarded for a fine performance against Ulster, and Cuthbert will be eager to get himself back in the XV after losing out to Tonks this season.

I think we'll win this, but have a sneaky suspicion we'll fall short of 4 tries.

I was beginning to wonder if his continuing absence was due to him being buried under RDW's patio..

RDW_Scotland wrote:

Weegie Wizard wrote:
Up front, it would be difficult to argue that you have the best pack in the league both in terms of starting 8 and subs.

Assuming that isn't a typo, I'd say we'd certainly be in the top 4 for pack strength in the league at least. Our front row was one of the form units in the world cup, and completely obliterated a lot of teams last season, and our back row boasts real quality and depth.  From memory we had the most successful lineout % last season, or one of the top ones at least, so our 2nd rows are pretty good too.

We don't have as much depth in the front row, but they are strong enough that we don't go from dominant to getting our arses handed to us when (if) they come off the bench. Young Sutherland is a future Scotland internationalist if he carries on his current trajectory. Gilchrist and Toolis both being injured at the same time is a blow, but Bresler and McKenzie outplayed their Ulster rivals last weekend.

Yeah I just read that again and it's a bit of a mess! The second string Edinburgh pack is probably Sutherland, McInally, Dell, Toolis, McKenzie, Coman, Watson and Denton. That's better than the first team of half the league

Turns out this game won't be on Italian tv after all, so we're down to relying on Twitter updates.

http://www.ultimaterugby.com/match/zebre-rugby-vs-edinburgh-rugby-at-stadio-sergio-lanfranchi-24th-oct-2015/9325


Rai Sport? 

If anyone finds a stream, share the love 

RAI preferred to show women footie instead, just goes to show the poor state of italian rugby at the moment.

Apparently there is a delayed coverage later on but that's very poor as this was supposed to be shown live.

i had a stream on periscope before the game now cant find the fkker.!!~

Winning 11-9 at half time after a Hamish Watson try.

Yeah and Fowles has left 5 points on the tee. Let's hope we can kick on in the second half.

SHC on at half time, should be pretty pumped up after not having a lot to do at the World cup!

11-16 with 20 to go

Losing 11-19 now

Kinghorn on for his debut

Back to earth with a bump - loss to the worst team in the league without a bp.

As expected Edinburgh are useless when matched up front. Only team of the weekend not getting a LBP too and that was against the bottom placed team..

The positives is there is a chance (albeit very slim) Coman and Strauss might be dropped after this game.

I didn't expect that at all.

The backs might not be incredibly exciting but they should be good enough to get a win vs Zebre.

Anyone see the game?

Can see this being the 'what if' result of we miss out on 6th place by a few points.

11 points missed off the tee.

Edinburgh apparently gave away 18 penalties

Watson and Sutherland get praise in the match report, but Solomons sounds raging with the performance.

What an absolute joke. Am furious about this. Sounds like the wheels came off in terms of discipline, and we desperately need Sam H-C back to nail the kicks.

We've undone all the hard work of the last 4 matches, not even getting a LBP. Pathetic.

Why oh why oh why - here I am - a man of west country (England ) descent and I end up being and Edinburgh and Scotland supporter.  Its not fair I tell you.  there is only so much heartbreak and pain I can take

*runs around doing the funkyfitzgibbon, frothing at the mouth*

Zebre
Zebre

Still ahead of you lot!

Unfortunately I can't see us staying there long - we've got Connacht away then a full strength Munster at home after. This just had to be a must win game.

The worry now is that Solomons again feels that he can't play anything other than his strongest team for every single game, which as we've seen in previous seasons just doesn't work.

Without any TV coverage it's hard to know how this game went but the penalty count against Edinburgh sounds horrendous.

http://www.skysports.com/watch/video/sports/rugby-union/10042068/edinburgh-miss-out-on-bonus-point

How was that not deliberate

Zebre almost had a full Italian internationalists front 5 coupled with 3 saffers loose forwards. Also in Canna they seem to have finally found a reliable kicker. Anyone remember how horrendous Kelly Haimona is?

Zebre plays like Connacht 3 or 4 years ago a tough pack of forwards but not much else behind and their defense usually creak after 3 or 4 phases which was obviously a couple of phases too much for Edinburgh. Remember, back play is AS speciality, no wonder it has been utter gash.

EWT Spoons wrote:http://www.skysports.com/watch/video/sports/rugby-union/10042068/edinburgh-miss-out-on-bonus-point

How was that not deliberate

Is that all the highlights they've got?

EWT Spoons wrote:http://www.skysports.com/watch/video/sports/rugby-union/10042068/edinburgh-miss-out-on-bonus-point

How was that not deliberate

That's a very strange decision from the ref, what else could the Zebre player have been doing there other than trying to stop the ball go over the crossbar? The fact that the ball was falling short is irrelevant, the player wasn't trying to catch the ball as he just jumped up and knocked it forward. Should have been another kick attempt for Edinburgh surely?

I just remembered that this match happened and came on here to check that we definitely got the TBP.

What, er, how can I put this... happened? Exactly?

George Carlin wrote:I just remembered that this match happened and came on here to check that we definitely got the TBP.

What, er, how can I put this... happened? Exactly?

Edinburgh rugby happened.

RDW_Scotland wrote:

George Carlin wrote:I just remembered that this match happened and came on here to check that we definitely got the TBP.

What, er, how can I put this... happened? Exactly?

Edinburgh rugby happened.

I was hoping that it wouldn't ever have to come to that.

Trying put a positive spin on things, we've lost away to Zebre 3 years in a row now so it maybe isn't as big a surprise as we think....

Also 4 out of 5 is probably as good a start to the season as we were expecting....

Nope, can't do it.

It's a shocking result.

I hope Solomons goes to town on the squad this week in training and absolutely beasts them. The players should require therapy after training this week.

Not sure where i read that but someone made the suggestion to move Watson to 12 or even 13. This is actually not a stupid idea as it would allow Hardie to do his job without losing forwards grunt. I'm all for it, if only to get rid of Strauss.

Connacht vs Edinburgh match thread

https://www.606v2.com/t61053-pro-12-connacht-rugby-vs-edinburgh-rugby-31st-oct#3192034

EWT Spoons wrote:Connacht vs Edinburgh match thread

https://www.606v2.com/t61053-pro-12-connacht-rugby-vs-edinburgh-rugby-31st-oct#3192034

Thanks Spoons. After the Zebre result I won't be doing a match thread again!!