MoTM: Saints suffer away at Quins.
By Saint Tim
September 18 2011
Week two and another game messed around with by the TV schedulers as Saints travelled down to the Stoop on Friday evening – only five days after a bruising opening match against Gloucester. Quins are a very good team and have proved a difficult nut for Saints to crack in recent years. This proved to be yet another disappointing visit to South London, made worse by the first score being by an old boy that many of us were very disappointed we lost.
Who was your MoTM as Saints went down at the Stoop?
I only got to see the first half of the game and to be honest I was very very disappointed with what I saw. We seemed slower in every thought and deed compared to Quins. I cannot understand why this was the case. It always looked that if we could pick up our pace and cut out the odd error there we would have been competitive. But we didn’t.
All in all a very disappointing day at the office! Now there is no dishonour in being beaten at Quins, they are as I said above a very good team, but we should have had at least a bonus point and if we continue to miss out on said BP’s it could be very important come the sharp end of the season.
What the Stats say
This is a new section as was suggested by St Tub. I am not an avid stats fan as to me they can show a picture at odds with what you see in front of you on the pitch. The stats can also be somewhat arbitrary (stats are ever thus I hear you say) but I am not averse to giving this a try. Let me know what you think and it may become a standard section.
So where in the stats did we appear to be better than Quins. Well in the following we looked better:
Missed Tackles (Quins 11 Saints 10)
Turnovers Conceded (Quins 12 Saints 9)
Offloads (Saints 7 Quins 6)
Defenders Beaten (Saints 11 Quins 10)
Penalties Conceded (Saints 14 Quins 15)
Yellow Cards (Saints 0 Quins 1)
So looking good you might say but I would suggest on the night these were the critical figures:
Passes (Quins 130 Saints 88)
Runs (Quins 105 Saints 72)
Tackles (Quins 73, Saints 133) – ouch they would have been sore come Saturday.
Metres run with the ball (Quins 233 Saints 168)
So who were the best performers – according to the stats.
Nutley and Callum Clark made the most tackles with 15 each, Noah Cato made the most distance with ball in hand with 29 metres and big Sam made the most off loads with 3.
Make of that what you will.
So, who caught the eye?
Three people this week stood out this week. In joint second place with 11% of the votes were Christian Day and Tom May.
The winner and the second for a forward was Alex Waller. Alex has now won the MoTM for every single game he has started for the senior team. That is a record which is quite unparalleled in the time I have been running the Man of the Match. Congratulations Alex. A star in the making.
Finally thanks to the 52 people who voted I know it is hard when the team loses to pick a Man of the Match but I am grateful for all those who did contribute.
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I'm very impressed by Alex Waller - what strength we have in the front row. If we can hang on to them all...
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David L
What if there were no hypothetical questions?
- Live wrong and preposterously
Appreciate as others pointed out they aren't always accurate but I think they do add