Prof's Positives - Week 1 (Gloucester - home)

By The Prof
September 5 2002

This is going to be a weekly column giving a completely unapologetic, one-eyed, biased and above all positive review of the previous game or games.

OK so we lost the first home game of the season 19-25 to Gloucester and then the seconds lost a home game on the Monday 24-27 to Saracens, but what positives can be drawn from these two disappointing score lines?

Looking at the first team game first, our back line looked more dangerous than it has done for a long time probably thanks to Paul Turner’s influence – will he be seen to be Evs and Scotty’s best buy, we’ll have to wait and see. The try that Moore scored was fantastic, the quick hands, speed and depth of running and execution were all out of the top drawer (and straight from the training pitch too). On the other wing Gollings had a good game working well in defence and adding pace to attacking moves, and but for an unlucky bounce he might have scored a try up the left.

New boy Nathan Williams had a pretty solid game at the back and looked confident under the high ball, and in the centres Greenwood and Bell worked very well together, it will be difficult to see where Big Bill Satala will fit in. Then again it must be nice for the management to have selection problems this way round for once.

Against the powerful Gloucester scrum Quins held their own with Jase, Woody and Gomez proving a solid front row that should give trouble to the opposition every week. The second row paining of Codling and Davison did very well especially in the line outs with Codling again proving that he is the best lineout stealer in the ZP.

The stand out performance of the whole team for me was Ace Tiatia who put in some huge tackles, and made a couple of try scoring ones in desperate situations. He also attacked well with some bullocking charges and supported Gollings well in an attack up the left which eventually lead to Burkey’s drop goal.

The front row was also very influential in the second team game – time and time again they completely destroyed the Saracens scrum. Having Starr, Caputo and Cardinali as a back up to the first choice front row and also having Ace available and Dawson on the mend after surgery is all good news. The second row of Evans and Rudzki did well and proved to be very mobile, and it earned Rudzki the right to replace the injured Codling against Leicester on Saturday. Another player who did well and has been awarded a start in the first team is Sherriff who is replacing Ace (who in return is replacing Woody as hooker).

In the backs the centre paining of Greenstock and Big Bill Satala (aka Godot) were impressive with Nick showing that although he is semi-retired he is still a quality centre and Bill showing some great skills, taking poor passes with the fingertips of one hand, offloading the ball in the tackle well and putting in some very big hits indeed.

Another player who put in big hits was the young full-back Wilcocks who managed to knock the ball out of the hands of the humungous Craig Quinnell in one tackle, and he managed to bounce the No.8 in another tackle. Jewell had another impressive game showing his strength in the tackle, but it was the other wing Ugo Monye who was the most impressive (despite his dodgy blond goatee to go with his dodgy blond hair). Again he showed his speed and strength. It always takes more than one defender to knock him down and his tackling is always very direct.

So what else can we look forward to – Tani Fuga will be back from injury soon giving us another option at hooker while Woody is away, Nick Duncombe has almost recovered from his injury, and the first team played well and showed a lot of spirit and we still have Vos to add to the mixture.