By GHA
#7136
London Irish:

15 Theo Brophy Clews
14 Curtis Rona
13 Tom Stephenson
12 Terrence Hepetema
11 Ollie Hassell-Collins
10 Paddy Jackson
9 Ben Meehan

1 Danny Hobbs-Awoyemi
2 Saia Fainga’a
3 Ollie Hoskins
4 Ruan Botha ©
5 Adam Coleman
6 Steve Mafi
7 Ben Donnell
8 Albert Tuisue

Replacements:

16 Motu Matu’u
17 Allan Dell
18 Lovejoy Chawatama
19 Barney Maddison
20 George Nott
21 Nick Phipps
22 Tom Fowlie
23 Phil Cokanasiga
By GHA
#7137
Toulon:

15 Bryce Heem
14 Masivesi Dakuwaqu
13 Julian Savea
12 Anthony Belleau
11 Gervais Cordin
10 Louis Carbonel
9 Baptiste Serin

1 Bruce Devaux
2 Anthony Etrillard (c)
3 Beka Gigashvili
4 Eben Etzebeth
5 Romain Taofifenua
6 Liam Messam
7 Charles Ollivon
8 Sergio Parisse

Replacements:

16 Bastien Soury
17 Jean Baptiste Gros
18 Sebastien Taofifenua
19 Daniel Ikpefan
20 Stephane Onambele
21 Ben Te'o
22 Yoann Cottin
23 Swan Rebbadj
By GC89
#7145
Great to have a back 5 of the pack with Botha, Coleman, Mafi and Tuisue. Donnell should be looked after.

Very interested to see how TBC goes at full back. It's a bit of a problem position for us.
User avatar
By Narbia
#7170
Some big names in that Toulon squad. Even more in the LI squad.
We really ought to win this. :)
By Margin_Walker
#7179
Strange game in the end. We played some nice stuff in patches but were hammered on the penalty count, which ultimately cost us. To be fair to the ref, most of the calls seemed fair enough (thought Hepetema was unlucky, although not seen a replay). It really did seem like one way traffic for a while though.

Botha, Coleman and Tuisui were great in the pack. Moment of the game for me was Botha getting back at Parrisse. The latter pulled away from a ruck at the last second causing Botha to go off his feet and concede a pen and followed up by making his point with a good back slapping before they squared up. Botha pointed and said something back and the very next play stuffed their maul holding Parisse up and returning the back slap.

Shame to essentially lose to such a soft try up the middle from the maul, but it was clever play from Serin. Think it's a bit early for Donnell in these games against a truly massive pack like the Toulon one and we definitely lacked a bit of threat out wide with Loader and Naholo unavailable.

Have we got a bit of an injury issue with the outside backs at the moment? We are light there anyway and definitely have Loader out. Stephenson took a big knock and Theo (who was looking great btw) looks in trouble with the injury he picked up today. To add to that,

Naholo's still in NZ
Macken's injured
Are Williams, Veitokani and Parton fit? Thought they may get the nod for the 23 in this game given that we put out a strong pack.

Will be interesting to see who features against Bath
By GC89
#7226
Williams is injured as far as I am aware and looks like Naholo won't be back for the Bath game, so it does leave us light. Fowlie has always looked dangerous for me out wide and I would give him the nod ahead of OHC and leave Rona on the other wing (assuming Stephenson is ok).
By Hsmith18
#7255
Will be interesting to see who gets the nod at 15. I get the feeling Declan wants to unleash paddy at 10 but our lack of options in the back 3 at the moment may lead to paddy playing 15 again.
By GC89
#7264
I think you are absolutely right. Dec wants Paddy at 10 as he brings more pace and creativity to the backline, but until we have someone a bit more solid at 15 I think we will stick with the Myler-Jackson axis for the big Prem matches.
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