[GHA]

Sale Sharks v London Irish – live on BT Sport Extra 1, coverage starts at 3pm, kick-off at 3pm
Referee: Craig Maxwell-Keys
Assistant Referees: Anthony Woodthorpe and Jamie Leahy
TMO: Rowan Kitt
Citing Officer: Budge Pountney

[SixNineOne]

This is our first experience of CMK this season - he was carded for our game against Saints which was cancelled.

[poyntonshark]

For my money Maxwell House has become one of the best in the league. One of very few to consistently ping sealing off at the ruck by the attacking side.

[SixNineOne]

For my money Maxwell House has become one of the best in the league. One of very few to consistently ping sealing off at the ruck by the attacking side.

Given that both our teams have been serial penalty offenders in recent games, it’ll be interesting to see which side adapts best to his style of adjudication!

[GHA]

15 James Stokes
14 Ben Loader
13 Curtis Rona
12 Theo Brophy Clews
11 Ollie Hassell-Collins
10 Paddy Jackson
9 Ben Meehan

1 Will Goodrick-Clarke
2 Agustin Creevy
3 Lovejoy Chawatama
4 Steve Mafi
5 Rob Simmons
6 Matt Rogerson (c)
7 Ben Donnell
8 Albert Tuisue

Replacements:

16 Matt Cornish
17 Facundo Gigena
18 Ollie Hoskins
19 George Nott
20 Blair Cowan
21 Nick Phipps
22 Will Joseph
23 Tom Parton

[Narbia]

That's about as full a squad as we can muster. so Blair getting a half-rest by being on the bench.
Maybe the team are well conditioned and resilient.

Give it out-wide to Ben Loader !

[shimmieandshake]

Being a useless eejit, I don't know how to copy the photo of Sale squad across.

But I actually fancy us to have a decent showing here. Our squad is more-or-less as strong as possible, some relatively unknown quantities in their side at 1, 7, 11 and 12, and Rob De Preez can blow hot and cold at 10.

If we can handle their power up front, which we can on a good day, there's no reason we can't pick up at least a point.

I felt Akker Van Der Merwe was massive for them in the game at Brentford. Hoping we can keep him quieter in the loose and attack his lineout more with Simmons in the picture.

[shimmieandshake]

Being a useless eejit, I don't know how to copy the photo of Sale squad across.

But I actually fancy us to have a decent showing here. Our squad is more-or-less as strong as possible, some relatively unknown quantities in their side at 1, 7, 11 and 12, and Rob De Preez can blow hot and cold at 10.

If we can handle their power up front, which we can on a good day, there's no reason we can't pick up at least a point.

I felt Akker Van Der Merwe was massive for them in the game at Brentford. Hoping we can keep him quieter in the loose and attack his lineout more with Simmons in the picture.

...looks like I accidentally succeeded in copying it across anyway. Never mind.

[Stevie J]

Yes in that first match Akker Van Der Merwe did a lot around the ruck, won a few penalties and turnovers and was a general nuisance though his darts were hit and miss.

Rohan Janse van Rensberg might be their biggest loss, as he was so hard to stop that first match and got them over the gain line, scoring a try. We tried to target him during kick-offs and it didn't seem to work.

For us to get anything, we have to be better with the referee and this week that's Maxwell-Keys. Can't give Sale 15 to 20 attempts to clear their lines or attack ours. We've averaged 12 this season but the last 2 weeks Tigers and Warriors really got the better of us. Sale have been worse by the numbers, 157 in total, but across 13 games its about even at 12 penalties a match.

We've never won at the AJ Bell. I'm naturally a pessimist and will again say a bonus point would be a great result for us.

[Lord Elpus]

We've never won at the AJ Bell.

That more or less guarantees you a win at the moment!

[SixNineOne]

We've never won at the AJ Bell.

That more or less guarantees you a win at the moment!

It’s clear that both sets of supporters are wary of this game. We haven’t won at the AJ Bell for a few millennia and the Sale supporters are worried about the rotation in their squad allied to an unsettled and untested back line. Rohan JvR missing is a big factor - their traditional game plan has been based on him blasting it up the middle taking out a handful of defenders in the process. Faf’s kicking is going to be key, so our back three need to be on their game. For me, though, the game is probably going to be decided on which team manages to adapt to CMK’s adjudication of the breakdown. If he’s going to be hot on lazy players flopping over the ball we’ll need to make sure we’re on our best behaviour. I just hope it’s not a repeat of the last time we visited the AJ Bell - I really enjoyed the trip but the result was not encouraging!

[Van Cannonball]

If it’s the CMK from last week he pretty much ignored the breakdown...

[poyntonshark]

That's bad news. If he has given up on policing it then I have to believe that they are being told to ignore it. Hopefully it was just a bad day at the office for him.

[SixNineOne]

It’s hard to know what to hope for - CMK ignoring breakdown infringements or CMK being a stickler...

[Margin_Walker]

Sale Away

Most depressing performance of the season.

Every. Single, Year

[Stevie J]

We look knackered. Physically and mentally. Not surprising but why didn't Kiss and Kidney rotate the team a bit. Just had a look, incl Europe, 14 games so far;

Rogerson 13 /14
Rona 13 / 14
Mafi 13 / 14
Jackson 13 / 14
Creevy 13 / 14

Many others have played a lot too, incl Albert since he came back from Fiji. Damage limitation this half.

[Margin_Walker]

Yep, Albert especially looks completely spent.

Whatever happens here, we are going to have to give a few players the week off against Bath.

[shimmieandshake]

Well, that'll teach me. I promise I'll never harbour optimism about visits to Manchester again!

Sooner that's forgotten, the better.

[Stevie J]

Really really wished we did what Tigers did yesterday. Realise its a marathon, not a sprint and rest up some key players for Bath at home. Now we've lost, got nothing, and more work for some tired looking players.

• Meehan didn't look good at all when he was on. At least Phipps service was quicker and got us going forward. I almost think we prefer a more helter-skelter game than Meehan's station to station approach.
• More dumb penalties. Every week. I'm almost tempted to say its because they are tired, but that's excuse making. Repeatedly dumb penalties right from the start put us under waves of pressure. Offside, hands in the ruck, side-entry...every week. Serial offenders at just about everything.
• Early on, we get a foothold and what happens? Mess up the restart. What is it we find so tough about them?
• Gigena's introduction hasn't been super at scrum time, is Dell injured?
• Can someone work out what happens to this team when the coach enters the M62? Honestly a Friday night is one thing but we never ever look capable at the AJ Bell regardless of the day. I'm not dismissing Sale's quality, I just want a game.
• We're still 6th but we are looking likely for a slide down to a more realistic landing spot. We've beaten some weak teams and racked up some nice bonus points. But I'm not sure I can see us arresting this slide in performance without freshening up the team.

[Narbia]

Not only did we put out over-used players in a game we were never going to win, we've now got them fully knackered ahead of a slightly winnable game at home.

[Lord Elpus]

Couple of things:-

Use the M6 and A57 not the M62 to try and get a result.

For much of the game I thought Sale were in white such were the errors and numbnuts rugby on display. You rested Cowan which may pay dividends as he's way better than the other forwards.

[GC89]

That was awful, definitely the worst performance of the season. I am frustrated because the players look knackered against Wuss and I think it would have been totally fair enough to rotate this week. As others have said, we either flog the same guys against Bath, or rotate our strongest team out in a much more winnable game.

With Albert dropping below his best and Theo at 12, we are really lacking some punch to get us over the gainline. Would definitely be an area of recruitment focus for me.

[SixNineOne]

All in all, it was a bit of a mismatch, exacerbated by the AJ Bell bogey. Unfortunately, Sale played appreciably better than they have done in recent weeks and looked hungry for the win, even when the result was guaranteed. By contrast, we looked really tired. Albert didn't seem to be able to catch a ball to save his life and our game was littered with mistakes that looked consistent with a group of players that were tired, on the back foot and therefore trying too hard. Like others, I think many of our frontline players have been overplayed in this block of games and I fear that we'll be in for a comprehensive mauling by Bath next Saturday, as I can't see a 6 day turnaround being nearly enough to restore our physical edge. Easy to say in hindsight, but I'd have sooner we rotated the squad for this match and saved our firepower for next week.

[shimmieandshake]

All in all, it was a bit of a mismatch, exacerbated by the AJ Bell bogey. Unfortunately, Sale played appreciably better than they have done in recent weeks and looked hungry for the win, even when the result was guaranteed. By contrast, we looked really tired. Albert didn't seem to be able to catch a ball to save his life and our game was littered with mistakes that looked consistent with a group of players that were tired, on the back foot and therefore trying too hard. Like others, I think many of our frontline players have been overplayed in this block of games and I fear that we'll be in for a comprehensive mauling by Bath next Saturday, as I can't see a 6 day turnaround being nearly enough to restore our physical edge. Easy to say in hindsight, but I'd have sooner we rotated the squad for this match and saved our firepower for next week.

Yep, I stand very much corrected on pre-game thoughts. Albert especially looked gassed from minute one. Think Rona's in need of a week off too. Possibly Mafi as well, despite how well he's been playing.

Jack Cooke's energy might be welcome for the Bath game. Munga also. And it will be great to have Parton starting again; our sense of attacking threat doubles when he's on the field.

[Margin_Walker]

I was surprised by how little we did rotate. It clearly didn't pay off.

I guess a lot depends on what approach we have to Europe. Assuming we are really going for it, then I don't think we've got much of an option than to give a few guys a week off.

The likes of Albert, Creevy, Rogerson Mafi and Rona would probably be top of the list. Cowan's a bit of a machine and it would be good timing for SOB and/or Coleman to be available this weekend. Perhaps PJ too, but it really depends how knackered he is.

[poyntonshark]

I am guessing that having seen Sale play lately, your coaching staff believed that they had a real chance to get that AJ Bell monkey off their backs. To be honest, I was of that opinion too. Thankfully (being selfish) I agree entirely with @SixNineOne, you guys were making the same kinds of unforced errors that we have been making lately and giving away the same kinds of, frankly, dumb penalties. We were far from error free, but significantly better than we have been. It looks like taking a hit for a couple of weeks is now unavoidable for you, but you have had a pretty strong academy for quite while, giving more of them some exposure is rarely a bad thing. Compared to where many of you seemed to think your season would end when it started you are still going to be well ahead.

[Margin_Walker]

Yeah, not getting too carried away with the loss, but it's pretty important not to sink like a stone at the end of the season.

We looked pretty tired out there and it was all pretty loose resulting in the turnover tries and more knock ons than I can remember all season. We actually had a lot more possession and territory than last week against Worcester, but nothing like the application in defence.

Anyway, onwards and upwards