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Israel Dagg blasts Crusaders, weighs in on Rob Penney's future
Former Crusaders fullback Israel Dagg has joined the growing chorus of fans and pundits in finally conceding the reigning Super Rugby Pacific champions’ standing at the bottom of the table is a fair reflection of the team’s current quality.
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It’s taken seven losses with just one win for the 2011 Rugby World Cup winner to have his hope of an eighth title in as many years squashed. The weekend’s hefty 37-15 loss to fellow bottom dwellers the Western Force appears to have proven too much for even the most optimistic Crusaders fans to overlook.
With results taking a sour turn in 2024, new coach Rob Penney has quickly found himself in the firing line.
As Dagg bluntly illustrated when reacting to the loss, the evidence of the team’s flaws is vast.
“It’s a difficult time for the Crusaders at the moment,” Dagg said on SENZ Breakfast. “37-15, after a start where Sevu Reece makes a break, Levi Aumua scores first and you think ok, they might have turned a corner here. But, man, the game just unravelled for them.
“They were penalised heavily; they’re the most penalised team in the competition and a lot of those penalties are in their control.
“For seven years they never had a maul try scored against them. On the weekend, they had three tries scored against them by the Western Force; who in that forward pack is going to be in the Wallabies? Probably none if I’m going to be completely honest.
“They miss the most tackles in the competition. They’re at the bottom of the table in all stats.
“They have the worst lineout success in the competition. And that’s going from winning competitions with arguably the greatest lock combination in Super Rugby. You’ve got Scott Barrett out, Sam Whitelock’s gone. It is not happy hunting for the Crusaders at the moment.
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“They get Codie Taylor back this week, but is that going to be enough? Probably not.
“It was hard to watch. Defensively, we’re lacking any passion, we’re lacking any certainty.
“You start to feel for Rob Penney because the finger is being pointed at him, but most of this is within the players’ control; 16 penalties, most of them for offside ruck infringements, that’s player decision-making that has been putting their team under so much pressure.
“Look, it was poor. It was disappointing. I’ll have to concede and say this is probably going to be a difficult year.
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“I thought they may have turned a corner, but you lose to the Waratahs and you are deflated, you spend a whole week together and then you put out a performance like that. It was disappointing.”
Even with the team going from hero to zero, Dagg argued it’s hard to see the coach paying the price, questioning whether a Crusaders coach had ever been fired for poor results.
Joining Penney in the coach’s box is a relatively young group consisting of James Marshall, Dan Perrin, the only recently retired Matt Todd and the man rumoured to be the future Crusaders head coach, Tamati Ellison.
Ellison appears to be the most likely candidate within that group to step up if Penney were to be dismissed, but the club could also look outside that crew for some more veteran mentorship to help develop the youthful environment.
“They’re a really inexperienced coaching group,” Dagg added. “Are you just setting them up to fail? They’ve got nothing to lose. Nothing to lose and those conversations will be had.
“A lot of people will be asking for Rob Penney to move on. I went through the socials yesterday and I was having a read and a lot of them were pointing the finger at Rob Penney, but also pointing the finger at a lot of players. For me, it’s probably more about player accountability.”
Comments on RugbyPass
If he had stopped insisting on playing in the backrow, instead of wing, where everyone told him he should, he would have been a Bok years ago….
11 Go to comments‘Salads don’t win scrums’ 😂 I love that.
19 Go to commentsCan’t wait for the article that talks about misogyny in Ireland. Somehow.
16 Go to commentsI would like to see a rule change, when the attacking team is held up over the try line, by allowing the defensive team to restart a goal line drop out releases the pressure for the defensive team, but what if the attacking team had to restart a tap 5m out from the defensive team it gives the attacking team to apply more pressure, there are endless options for the attacking side and it will keep the fans in suspence.
2 Go to commentsLess modern South African males predictably triggered.
16 Go to commentsMy heart is with Quins, but the head is convinced Toulouse have too much. Ntamack is back, his timing and wisdom has been missed.
1 Go to commentsWow, what a starting line up for the Sharks) Tasty up front,kremer vs Tshituka or venter …fiery ,,Lavannini ,,will he knobble etzebeth? Biggest game for belleau?
1 Go to commentsIt was rubbish to watch, Blues weren’t even present. Did what they had to do, nothing more. Should be better next week against canes.
1 Go to commentsI’ve just noticed that this match has an all-French refereeing team. Surely a game like this ought to have a neutral ref? Although looking at the BBC preview of the Saints game, Raynal is also down as reffing that - so there may be some confusion about who is reffing what.
1 Go to commentsIf Havili can play anywhere in the back line, why not first 5. #10.
11 Go to commentsThe dressing room had already left for their summer break before they ran out in Dublin that year, and that’s on the coach. Franco Smith has undoubtedly made progress, particularly their maul, developing squad players and increasing squad depth. And against a very tight budget too. That said they were too lightweight last year and got found out against both Toulon and Munster in consecutive games. Better this season so far but they’ve developed something of a slow start habit occasionally, most notably losing at home to Northampton who played them at their own game. Play offs will ultimately show whether there has been tangible progress on last year, or not…!
2 Go to commentsAustralian Rugby has been a disaster, by not incorporating learning from previous successful campaigns. QLD Reds 2011 - Waratahs 2014. Players, coaches and administrators appoint there representatives for scheduled meetings, organisation’s agreement’s assessments and correspondence. This why a unified Rugby Union under one entity works. Every Rugby nation has taken that path. Was most difficult in the Northern hemisphere with over 100 years of club rugby before the game become professional. Took a lot of humility for those unions to eventually work together.
7 Go to commentsThough Wilson’s sacking was pretty brutal, it wasn’t just down to that Leinster game; Glasgow had a lot of 2nd half collapses that season, in the URC and Europe, and only just scraped into the playoffs. Franco Smith has definitely been an improvement, some players are delivering far more than they did under Wilson.
2 Go to commentsjesus - that front 5!
1 Go to commentsShould be an absolute cracker of a game! Will be great to see DuPont & Ntamack in tandem once again🔥
1 Go to commentsBest team ever…. To have played? These guys are still pressure chokers. Came nowhere when it counted. What a joke
81 Go to commentsMusk defends anonymous terrorism, fascism, threats against individuals and children etc etc But a Rugby club account….lock ‘em up!!!
2 Go to commentsActually the era defining moment came a few years earlier. February 2002 to be precise, when Michael D Higgins as finance minister at the time introduced his sports persons tax relief bill to the dial. As the politicians of the day stated “It seems to be another daft K Club frolic born in Kildare amongst the well-paid professional jockeys with whom the Minister plays golf” and that the scheme represented “a savage uncaring vision of Ireland and one that should be condemned”. The irfu and Leinster would be nowhere near the position they are in today without this key component of the finances.
5 Go to commentsIt is crystal clear that people who make such threats on line should be tried and imprisoned. Those with responsibility in social media companies who don’t facilitate this should be convicted. In real life, I have free speech to approach someone like Reinach and verbally threaten him. I am risking a conviction or a slap but I could do it. In the old days, If someone anonymously threatened someone by letter the police would ask and use evidence from the postal system. Unlike the Post, social media companies have complete instant and legal access to the content in social media. They make money from the data, billions. Yet, they turn a blind eye to terrorism, Nazi-ism and industrial levels of threats against individuals including their address and childrens schools being published online all from ananoymous accounts not real people. They claim free speech. Free speech for anonymous trolls/voilent thugs threatening people under false names? The fault is with the perps but also social media companies who think anonymous personas posting death threats constitutes free speech.
2 Go to commentsSo if this ain’t the best Irish team ever then who exactly is? I don’t remember any other Irish team being this good & winning a series in the Land of the Long White Cloud. Yes I may rip them often for 8 X QF RWC exits & twice not even making it to the QF, but they’re a damn good team who many think can only improve, including me!
81 Go to comments