[Narbia]

From the Tiger's board : Sirs are..

Referee: Wayne Barnes (235th Premiership game). Assistant Referees: Christophe Ridley & Philip Watters. TMO: Stuart Terheege. Citing Officer: Brian Campsall.‌

I guess the team gets announced tomorrow @12 noon ?

[SixNineOne]

According to www.rugbyreferee.net, the Bath v Glaws match a fortnight ago was Barnes’ 235th match and they haven’t made any official announcement yet about referee assignments for this weekend. So we’ll have to wait and see if the Tigers board has good insider info or whether they’re off beam. I can’t recall Wayne refereeing us recently but hopefully he’ll bring his normal good sense to bear - I just hope Ben Meehan doesn’t decide to try and out-argue him!

[GHA]

Us:

15 Tom Parton
14 Ben Loader
13 Curtis Rona
12 Terrence Hepetema
11 Ollie Hassell-Collins
10 Paddy Jackson
9 Nick Phipps

1 Will Goodrick-Clarke
2 Agustin Creevy
3 Lovejoy Chawatama
4 Steve Mafi
5 Rob Simmons
6 Matt Rogerson ©
7 Blair Cowan
8 Albert Tuisue

Replacements:

16 Matt Cornish
17 Allan Dell
18 Ollie Hoskins
19 Chunya Munga
20 George Nott
21 Ben Donnell
22 Ben Meehan
23 Will Joseph

[GHA]

Them:

15 Freddie Steward
14 Kobus Van Wyk
13 Matías Moroni
12 Matt Scott
11 Guy Porter
10 Zack Henry
9 Richard Wigglesworth

1 Luan de Bruin
2 Tom Youngs
3 Dan Cole
4 Calum Green
5 Tomás Lavanini
6 Harry Wells
7 Tommy Reffell
8 Cyle Brink

Replacements:

16 Charlie Clare
17 Nephi Leatigaga
18 Joe Heyes
19 Ollie Chessum
20 Luke Wallace
21 Jack Van Poortvliet
22 Johnny McPhillips
23 Kini Murimurivalu

[Margin_Walker]

Montoya not being in for Tigers is useful, although I'm sure Creevy would have enjoyed that showdown.

Best available team for us. Nothing much to grumble about. Slight chance on the 6:2 bench split, but it often pays off

[shimmieandshake]

Yep, feels like a slightly bigger chance with Joseph being uncapped, but it's certainly interesting that he appears to be ahead of Stokes in the pecking order...

Must be doing some good things in training, which is exciting if it translates into games.

Best available side, as you say. We should win, really, but it's sure to be a tough game.

[Iron Lung]

This promises to be a good game. Welford Road isn't one of our happier hunting grounds but we're showing some real fighting spirit right now and competing for the whole 80.

Is Facundo Gigena available for selection? I seem to remember a mention of him arriving injured.

[Narbia]

Well done guys ! It ain't over until the fat lady sings. Great to show confidence at the death there.

[Margin_Walker]

No idea what to say about that game. It's never dull and will take the two points.

Really poor from Hepetema for the red.

Onwards and upwards

[GHA]

Pleased to go for the bonus point at the end and to end up losing by only one point despite playing 30 minutes a man down. Disappointed that one missed penalty, one small knock on or one possibly unnecessary bit of blocking stopped us winning it - it would've been good if the officials had had a look at Leicester's first try for obstruction considering how long they spent looking at a lot of our play. Although it's certainly not the officials' fault we gave away 20-odd penalties.

I was pleased that Phipps' pass looked much quicker than usual but unfortunately everything else looked worse. Also, and I have no idea about scrums, but is Dell usually a good scrummager? Because he was awful in there when he came on.

[Narbia]

I was going to see what the Tigers supporters' take on things were, but it looks to me as SN has croaked and died. Anyone got 50p coin for their electricity meter?

[Margin_Walker]

I was going to see what the Tigers supporters' take on things were, but it looks to me as SN has croaked and died. Anyone got 50p coin for their electricity meter?

They tend to get more traffic on this forum anyway

https://forum.leicestertigers.com/viewforum.php?f=1

[Narbia]

Really poor from Hepetema for the red.

He can be such a good player - I just don't know what goes through his mind. Red card all day long.

[Heaf]

Unfortunately I missed most of the match as had to be on a zoom call - bit annoying to hear we had 2 tries ruled out when Tigers obstruction wasn't looked at. Were the ones we had scrubbed any more obvious than the Tigers' one or are we suffering from the usual lack of consistency?

[SixNineOne]

Unfortunately I missed most of the match as had to be on a zoom call - bit annoying to hear we had 2 tries ruled out when Tigers obstruction wasn't looked at. Were the ones we had scrubbed any more obvious than the Tigers' one or are we suffering from the usual lack of consistency?

I don’t think we can complain about the tries that we had chalked off. The sad thing is that the first one was a needless infringement by Hepetema that actually had no real effect on the subsequent disallowed score, but it was clearly foul play so the try got overruled. However pleased we may be about our extraordinary fight back in the final few minutes, we can’t escape the fact that we gave away 20 penalties (a season record for the Premiership) and we’ve lost two of our key players. I suspect Hepetema will get the book thrown at him for his red card and Tom Parton’s knee didn’t look too good either - I don’t know if that was the one he bust last time.

[Heaf]

OK thanks - doesn't sound too clever. I have no issue with tries being ruled out fairly but it grates a bit when obstruction by the other team doesn't get the try ruled out too. From what I saw a dummy runner ran straight into a defender - if you're in front of the ball and run into an opposing player that should really be picked up by the officials to at least have a look.

[Mañoexile]

Ben Coles tweet: Declan Kidney on Parton's knee: "It's a little bit sore. He'll take a couple of weeks."

[GHA]

I'm hopeful on Parton because after assessment they were prepared for him to give it a go and stay on, rather than taking him off immediately as soon as it happened.

[GHA]

OK thanks - doesn't sound too clever. I have no issue with tries being ruled out fairly but it grates a bit when obstruction by the other team doesn't get the try ruled out too. From what I saw a dummy runner ran straight into a defender - if you're in front of the ball and run into an opposing player that should really be picked up by the officials to at least have a look.

A further look would've been good, because even if they didn't disallow Leicester's try after a review they may have then allowed ours to stand on a like-for-like basis. Ah well

[GC89]

Delighted with the two points from where we were with 20 to go. Really feel like we should have capitalised more in the first half. We controlled the play and the territory and I do feel like the commentators were correct - we tried to overcomplicate things. If we had kept it simple and moved the ball away from the breakdown at pace, I think we would have had enough to have created more chances. Parton going off probably didn't help in this regard.

Positives - Jackson was brilliant in the first half and Mafi continues to be a gem in the pack. Thought Joseph looked really good when he came on and looks ready for cameos at this level.

Onwards and upwards. Worcester will be no mugs.

[Florida]

OK thanks - doesn't sound too clever. I have no issue with tries being ruled out fairly but it grates a bit when obstruction by the other team doesn't get the try ruled out too. From what I saw a dummy runner ran straight into a defender - if you're in front of the ball and run into an opposing player that should really be picked up by the officials to at least have a look.

A further look would've been good, because even if they didn't disallow Leicester's try after a review they may have then allowed ours to stand on a like-for-like basis. Ah well

Ours would never have been awarded as it was a deliberate act of foul play from Heps.

[GHA]

OK thanks - doesn't sound too clever. I have no issue with tries being ruled out fairly but it grates a bit when obstruction by the other team doesn't get the try ruled out too. From what I saw a dummy runner ran straight into a defender - if you're in front of the ball and run into an opposing player that should really be picked up by the officials to at least have a look.

A further look would've been good, because even if they didn't disallow Leicester's try after a review they may have then allowed ours to stand on a like-for-like basis. Ah well

Ours would never have been awarded as it was a deliberate act of foul play from Heps.

Material impact though, plus their 12 ran into PJ for their try and that looked pretty deliberate to me. If they'd reviewed it and said there is contact but he wouldn't've got there, they might've reviewed ours and said the same.

Saying that there were a couple of times we were pinged for what looked like things that to me had no impact, i.e. We gave away a penalty for crossing despite the ball carrier being immediately tackled (so no advantage gained from the crossing), so maybe what I thought about materiality is slightly out of date!

[SixNineOne]

We all love analysing the referee’s decisions that go against us, but we can’t escape the fact that we gave away 20 odd penalties, and even if a couple of them were dubious, that’s still way, way too many. Given that our discipline has been generally pretty good this season (certainly by our own previous standards) it looks like Tigers managed to get under our skins or we managed to put ourselves under pressure. Strangely enough, it wasn’t until we were genuinely under pressure in the final 10 minutes that we seemed to flick the switch and re-gather our focus. No doubt smarter people than I will be thinking about this at Hazelwood, so I just hope they can help us regain our equilibrium. Any more key players getting red cards and we’ll be in real trouble...

[poyntonshark]

Material impact doesn't apply to those offences deemed as Foul Play. Obstruction is deemed Foul Play.

[GHA]

Material impact doesn't apply to those offences deemed as Foul Play. Obstruction is deemed Foul Play.

I thought I'd heard refs say 'tackle made' or similar when possible crossing infringements had occurred, although maybe that was just on accidental obstructions and play continued? Either way, it would've been nice if their first try had been reviewed but it wasn't, never mind.

[poyntonshark]

Wasn't a comment on that try, I haven't seen your game yet, just in general. Though of course, you are right, if the player gets to the tackle anyway, then he wasn't really obstructed.

[GHA]

Wasn't a comment on that try, I haven't seen your game yet, just in general. Though of course, you are right, if the player gets to the tackle anyway, then he wasn't really obstructed.

We were pinged for not retreating 10 when PJ booted it from our 22 to their 22 - most of our team were between our 10 and halfway and to me the receiver had time and space to move forward if he wanted to, but they got a penalty around halfway.

With the crossing I think PJ dummied a short pop and went round the back, so our runner went into defender 1 in front of the ball but defender 2 immediately tackled PJ so we didn't 'gain' anything by the crossing.

And finally, for their try an inside dummy runner made some slight contact with PJ (that man again) and the ball went back inside through the hole that Paddy might or might not have filled if he hadn't been contacted. We had a try disallowed later on for a more blatant obstruction of a defender as we went down the blindside, although the commentators were suggesting the defender might not've got there anyway.

Three interesting (to me!) little snippets that could've been done differently, according to a London Irish fan, compared to how they were actually dealt with to Wayne Barnes, an experienced and world class referee! But like you've said if foul play takes material impact out of the equation that would explain why the three pens against us were given - the two obstructions were also a lot more obvious than anything Tigers might or might not have done.

[Stevie J]

I had a sneaking suspicion in the lead up to the match we would come a cropper. Friday nights, featured TV match, good run. All likely to end and so it came to pass.

As others have said for me the key was the first half, after the good start we got stuck playing some impatient, overly complex strike moves. They left Tigers off the hook and able to clear their lines and play the game they were more comfortable with.

Outside of that Hepetema is now likely going to be out for at least 3 weeks, so if TBC is not over his injury then I'm guessing it will be Cokanasiga alongside Rona for Worcester. The red card, and the two disallowed tries were all the right decisions from Barnesey as you'd expect.

As ever the character of the side does stand out; Joseph was thrown in at the deep end but showed his pace and elusiveness that helped us get in position for the penalty try. For a kid just come into the academy that certainly sparks excitement (I'm old enough to remember his brother getting games on the wing to start, including exciting Stuart Barnes no end with a try at Newcastle.)

Still - we are in sixth place and as close to the top as we are the bottom. After our recent seasons its still a joy to be able to be disappointed in a match like Fridays, rack up a score and pick up bonus points.

[Margin_Walker]

I remember that try against Newcastle still and the break on Friday to get us up the field was definitely reminiscent. He looks a superb prospect and you can clearly see why they are fast tracking him.

I watched the last ten minutes of the game again. We really are getting a huge amount of mileage from our finishes to games. It's a real key to being competitive in this league. I've watched us surrender on plenty of occasions in the last few years in the closing stages, where as this season we are finishing like a train and it's picking us up plenty of points.

Just a shame we couldn't string a better performance together over the 80 on Friday. That period in the third quarter when we were leaking pens and the scrum issues when the props were replaced were key. Heyes is a handful, but it may be time for Gigena to get a run in front of Dell next week.

[Stevie J]

I remember that try against Newcastle still and the break on Friday to get us up the field was definitely reminiscent. He looks a superb prospect and you can clearly see why they are fast tracking him.

Here for those with a hazy memory or were too young;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gvFmRz ... H&index=11

[GC89]

What has happened to Gigena? I thought I saw instagram evidence of him and his partner flying out of the country. Not to be downbeat on Dell, but that bit of progress we saw seems to have stopped. Feels like it is probably a lot of money to be spending on someone who could feasibly end the season as 3rd choice.

[Margin_Walker]

I remember that try against Newcastle still and the break on Friday to get us up the field was definitely reminiscent. He looks a superb prospect and you can clearly see why they are fast tracking him.

Here for those with a hazy memory or were too young;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gvFmRz ... H&index=11

That's the one. Just looking through a few of his tries from Motti's playlists. He really was some player when he burst onto the scene.

[GC89]

He was a sublime player with a tremendous outside arc of a break. Genuinely got us points we didn't deserve through moments of brilliance. All went a bit pete tong when BS decided he should play 15...