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'I'm sure he'll handle pressure of a home crowd baying for blood'
Harlequins have braced themselves for the challenge of trying to silence a partisan French crowd this weekend who are sure to give Georgian referee Nika Amashukeli quite a baptism of fire when he takes charge of this Sunday’s Champions Cup opener versus Castres. It was eleven months ago when rookie official Amashukeli was denied his refereeing debut in Europe’s premier club competition, pandemic restrictions resulting in the cancellation of Harlequins’ planned January trip to Racing.
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The Georgian has since gone on to referee a round of 16 Challenge Cup match between London Irish and Cardiff, while also making his tier-one Test level breakthrough by taking charge of the Wales-Canada and Ireland-Japan matches. However, a Champions Cup game in France will likely produce an atmosphere he hasn’t had to deal with previously.
“We are aware that the referee is going to play a key part in the game and we generally pride ourselves on our discipline,” explained Harlequins assistant Jerry Flannery ahead of their round one Champions Cup assignment. “It’s one of the strongest parts of our game and this referee, I watched him when he refereed Japan and Ireland and I thought he had a good game there. It was quite a one-sided game, I can’t see our game going the same way but I am sure he will handle the pressure of a home crowd baying for blood and he will make the right calls.
“The vision for the club is to be one of the most admired in Europe and you are only going to do that if you perform well in the European competition and the Champions Cup is the premier club competition in the northern hemisphere so I don’t think we have had to sell it to the players.
“Some of the lads haven’t played away in France in the Champions Cup so we are just prepping them for that and the trick is when you play your first game away in France and Castres at home, they are a really proud team, they have had some good results lately but they are probably not where they would like to be in the league but they are going to go hell for leather on this.
The 2020 memory that still has English champions Harlequins breaking out in a cold sweat…#Harlequins #CASvHAR #HeinekenChampionsCup
— RugbyPass (@RugbyPass) December 7, 2021
“What I have seen in the past from French teams, if they don’t go well in the initial couple of rounds they generally tend to field a weakened team. We’re not going to bet that, we are going to get the strongest Castres at their best after a great win against Racing. How we handle that, how we handle the referee, how the referee handles the crowd there, his decision making will be key.”
Amashukeli is one of four first-time Champions Cup referees who will feature over the opening two rounds. Wales Craig Evans (Exeter-Montpellier), Italy’s Andrea Piardi (Ospreys-Sale) and France’s Tual Trainini (Harlequins-Cardiff) are the other whistle-blowing newcomers and while Harlequins will hope Amashukeli will hold his nerve at Castres, they head there very satisfied with the set-piece discipline in last Sunday’s narrow league loss at Leicester.
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“We won four penalties at the lineout, we won three penalties at the scrum which is pretty impressive to go to Welford Road,” reckoned Flannery. “Just some of the stuff that we normally do very well, our aerial game and out structured are really, really strong and they were probably off a little bit but you fix those things in a week.”
HARLEQUINS (vs Castres, Sunday)
1. Joe Marler
2. Jack Walker
3. Will Collier
4. Dino Lamb
5. Stephan Lewies – Captain
6. James Chisholm
7. Tom Lawday
8. Alex Dombrandt
9. Danny Care
10. Marcus Smith
11. Cadan Murley
12. Andre Esterhuizen
13. Huw Jones
14. Louis Lynagh
15. Tyrone Green
Reps:
16. Jack Musk
17. Santiago Garcia Botta
18. Simon Kerrod
19. Hugh Tizard
20. Jack Kenningham
21. Lewis Gjaltema
22. Will Edwards
23. Oscar Beard
Comments on RugbyPass
Why cant I watch Rugby games please?
1 Go to commentsBeautiful shot from Finau, end of story. Gutted for Shaun Stevenson though.
4 Go to commentsThe Chiefs definitely didn’t win ugly. They had the superior scrum, a dominant lineout, and their defence was excellent once the Waratahs scored their two tries (thanks to some lucky refereeing calls mind you). They put pressure on the Waratahs lineout throughout the game, and the mind boggles as to why the referee did not award a yellow card or a penalty try against the Waratahs for repeated scrum infringements on their own try line before Narawa’s first try. And the Chiefs were slick with their passing and running angles on attack. It was a dominant performance all round, even with many questionable refereeing decisions.
1 Go to commentsWasnt late. Ref 2 assistants andTMO all saw it so who are you to say it was?
4 Go to commentsAre the Brumbies playing the Blues twice in a row?
4 Go to commentsBig difference from the Saders. Forwards really muscled up and laid a solid platform. Scooter brought some steel and I liked the loosie combination. Newell has been rather disappointing this season but stepped up big time - happy also to see Franks dot down. He should do that more often! Reihana had a good game and there seems to be more flair and invention with him in the saddle. McNicoll plays well from the back and is reliable plus inventive when he joins the line. Keep it up chaps!
3 Go to comments🤦♂️🤣 who cares who’s the best . All I know is the All Blacks have the star coach but have few star players now …
30 Go to commentsJe suis sûr que Farrell est impatient de jouer avec Lopez et Machenaud et d’être entraîné par Collazo… 🤭
1 Go to commentsAn on field red (aka a full red) in SRP must surely carry a bigger suspension than a red card given by the bunker as that carries a 20 minute team punishment. Had Damon Murphy abdicated his responsibility as a ref and issued both Drua players a yellow, which would have been upgraded to a 20 minute red by the bunker, that would have killed Australia and New Zealand’s push for the 20 minute red to be trialled globally from July this year.
11 Go to commentsEver so often you all post a Danny Care story that isn’t the announcement that he has finally re-signed for one more, victory tour season at Quins and I’m just like, “well you fooled me again!” My absolute favorite player ever, we need to make his final year at the Stoop (and Twickers) official already. I know he supposedly snubbed France but I won’t feel better until he signs.
1 Go to commentslate hit what late hit it wasn’t at all late and can clearly see he was committed before the tackle
4 Go to commentsChristian Lio -Willies 2 try perfomance was a standout. As was captain Scott Barrett. Up front was where the boys won it.They are a great team and players. Fantastic Crusaders , you can keep going.
3 Go to commentsI don't know how the locals feel about that? I guess if you call yourselves the Worcester Wasps that might be appease. But really we need more teams in the Premiership in my view so they are not padding it out as they are at the moment. It might curtail so many players going abroad as well
5 Go to commentsNZ 😭😭😭is certainly rivaling England for best whingers cup!😭😭😭 !!!
30 Go to commentsYup. New Zealand won 3 out of 10 world cups played. SA 4 out of 8 attempts 30 Vs 50 per cent.🤔🤔
30 Go to commentsShould've done this years ago. Change Saturday kick off times to around 11am. Up and off and back home before 3pm, limit travel time too. Allows players to actually do something else with their Saturday that's family oriented or being rugby fans they could ‘watch’ pro rugby. Increases crowds etc. How can anyone that enjoys grassroots and pro rugby have to choose between the two on Saturdays?
9 Go to commentsI bet he inspired those supporters just as much.
1 Go to commentsBen Smith Springboks living rent free in his head 😊😂
67 Go to commentsGood to hear he would like to play the game at the highest level, I hadn’t been to sure how much of a motivator that was before now. Sadly he’s probably chosen the rugby club to go to. Try not to worry about all the input about how you should play rugby Joey and just try to emulate what you do on the league field and have fun. You’ll limit your game too much (well not really because he’s a standard athlete like SBW and he’ll still have enough) if you’re trying to make sure you can recycle the ball back etc. On the other hard, you can totally just try and recycle by looking to offload any and everywhere if you’re going to ground 😋
1 Go to commentsThis just proves that theres always a stat and a metric to use to justify your abilities and your success. Ben did it last week by creating an imaginary competition and now you did the same to counter his argument and espouse a new yardstick for success. Why not just use the current one and lets say the Boks have won 4 world cups making them the most successful world cup team. Outside of the world cup the All Blacks are the most successful team winning countless rugby championships and dominating the rankings with high win percentages. Over the last 4 years statistically the Irish are the best having the highest win rate and also having positive records against every tier 1 side. The most successful Northern team in the game has been England with a world cup title and the most six nations titles in history. The AB’s are the most dominant team in history with the highest win rate and 3 world cups. Lets not try to reinvent the wheel. Just be honest about the actual stats and what each team has been good at doing and that will be enough to define their level of success.
30 Go to comments