The Bard

pedant

It has to be said that selling out this game is a pretty remarkable achievement. There are about 5,000 season ticket holders meaning 20,000 tickets have been sold. Prices range between £25 and £42 for adults. Add to this the beer and food sales which are going to be more than a football match then it's probably a bigger money spinner than the Man U and Man CIty games. Only difference there is I suspect the TV money is less. It's always a bad time to admit something to be ashamed of...

I worry about our centres. 2cpc does tend to drop a massive bollock fairly often and Hurrell is a bit head down and charge, missing opportunities to put team mates in. Pleased to see Daniels in at 15. He is an excellent player.

Warm up games are a bit hollow. They'll only run a couple of moves to be used in games to keep stuff up their sleeve. I thought Bristol looked in good nick against Connaught. It will be a close game.

One thing that listening to the game annoyed the hell out of me was our final substitution. All for Eisa coming on as he's a goal threat. Problem I have is with the manager taking off our main set piece taker. In the 3 minutes without Eliasson, we made a mess of 2 excellent set piece opportunities through poor delivery. Sorry but it's flipping obvious that you leave your set piece taker on the pitch if you're going for a win...

Hopefully both will have home games in the quarters.... Both then get through to finals day,

Would be interesting to hear of a better hat trick in the history of the game. 3 world class batsman

Remember posting about the electrification a couple of years ago saying it was made up to give the contractors the profit they wanted. £1 million extra per metre of height was quoted. People thought it was a good idea. It's amazing how people simply can't see through this..

Yeah. It's there. Just need some buses stopping at it...

If it was tighter a few players who are currently loaned out or have had their contracts ended early would be playing. No Chris Vui or LuaTua is making a big difference as well. We just look like a bog standard Championship side at the moment. Set piece is really poor. I guess that's why we've signed about 8 front rowers for next season.

I'm not. Not part of the future and looking for a new club. I suspect Bristol offered a contract but it was a lot less than he thinks he is worth

The signing I like the most is Jake Heenan. Flanker who Lam compares to Ritchie McKaw. 25 years old, was captain of the All Blacks under 20s. Played under Lam at Connaught.

It was an absolute stroll. A lot of showboating going on in the 2nd half. We were basically playing Cardiff's 3rd team really. What's someone like Madigan is doing playing in a game like that?

That's not the point. It's the effect on the midfield.

If we are to harbour any hopes of the top 2, we simply must get something tonight. 8 points behind with 18 games left and the likes of Derby, Villa and Cardiff all flexing their muscles could prove too much of a challenge. I hope he goes with our strongest side and that means our 2 new signings are on the bench. We need to be solid with a team that knows what it's doing together. That means Maggers back in to the team for definite. Bring Kent on later if we need to with the Loan deal etc..

They'll recruit well this summer - some world class but mostly Premiership class talent. Target next season will be top 7. Get into Champions Cup first time. Basically need to get ourselves above Sale, Newcastle, Worcester for sure plus catch a couple of Glaws, Quins or Northampton... Easy...

Game yesterday was an absolute cakewalk. Some really nice play but Rotherham missed so many tackles and looked 3rd rate. Entertaining

I hope 3 5 2 was the plan all along as opposed to being a reaction to Wright's suspension.

Insanity. He's hardly taken over a successful operation and messed it up has he? They are genuine League 1 contenders. On the Radio some idiot (Phil Neville?) was suggesting the Shrewsbury manager. Now, he's done well but is hardly better qualified than Grayson to do this job. Can't see who they could employ - they'd picked a proven manager at this level and have got rid of him.

I can assure you that was not the case. Our game management was not at all helped by having a kid come on whose confidence has gone and moving Bobby into midfield when he was clearly knackered. Pack was steady tonight and subbing him weakened us due to the domino effect of changes.

Obvious thing to say, but next goal is everything in this game. We score it and we can get 4 or 5. They score it and it could go a bit Pete Tong

But that was League 1.

He will definitely return against Burton. It's the Friday after an international break so Bailey Wright will almost certainly be left out. Australia are playing in Sydney 3 days earlier.. It will be interesting to see what happens for the game after. Who will be picked out of Flint, Baker and Wright at CB

Probably because last winter he went to play Club cricket in Australia, did really well and got picked for the state side (Queensland?). So he has recent successful experience in the conditions we're playing in. Makes perfect sense to me.

That squad is shocking. Seems to me that One day cricket is being prioritised. Personally would have picked Hales and Buttler (as a batsman) and taken Rashid. Cook, Root, Bairstow, Stokes, Ali, Woakes, Broad, Anderson. Those 8 know what they're doing. The rest are either untried, unproven or already found out. Balance? The bloke will just be Johnson's bitch if he's picked.