Midterm report cards: Cardiff Blues, Ospreys, Scarlets and Dragons
Fans of the Ospreys and Scarlets were celebrating on Saturday night following the first inter-regional clashes of 2019.
It has been a festive period that has provided a bit of cheer for supporters of all four Welsh regions, in truth, with the Cardiff Blues claiming two victories and the Dragons finally winning a derby.
But as attention switches back to Europe, where do the Welsh sides stand going into the new year? RugbyPass takes a look at how each of the regions have fared so far this season.
Conference A
Cardiff Blues
Position: 5th
John Mulvihill’s reign in the Welsh capital got off to an inauspicious start with a narrow home defeat to Leinster followed by losses on the road to both Benetton and Zebre.
The Blues subsequently rallied, however, and went into Saturday’s clash with the Ospreys having won six of their previous nine PRO14 matches.
Defeat at the Liberty Stadium means Mulvihill’s side have lost more league matches than they have won going into the Champions Cup break, but they remain in the hunt for a play-off place.
Europe has not been a happy hunting ground for the Challenge Cup holders this term, despite an impressive away win at Lyon on the opening weekend, and Mulvihill may well choose to rotate his squad over the next fortnight.
Resting key players could be a sensible move with play-off rivals Connacht scheduled to visit the Cardiff Arms Park on January 26.
That is the start of a challenging run for the Blues, whose final eight regular season games – bar the home tie against the Southern Kings in March – are all against sides chasing a place in the play-offs.
Mulvihill would be wise to wrap Nick Williams in cotton wool. Having agreed to release Samu Manoa on compassionate grounds, and with captain Ellis Jenkins a long-term absentee, the number eight faces an intense workload.
New Year wish: Manoa had been brought in to alleviate the pressure on Williams but the USA international struggled to make an impact. His departure leaves the Blues short at the base of the scrum, where bar Seb Davies and Josh Navidi they are low on options. Mulvihill will hope to unearth another back-row star – potentially Jim Botham.
Ospreys
Position: 3rd
Ahead of the visit of the Cardiff Blues on Saturday, head coach Allen Clarke reiterated the importance of beating conference rivals as the race for the play-offs heats up.
He would have been delighted with the four points, therefore, but problems in attack remain. Ospreys dominated possession and territory in the second period at the Liberty Stadium but were unable to add to first-half tries from Scott Williams and George North.
It has been a familiar story for the region this season and one that could potentially cost them come the end of the regular season.
The Ospreys have won the same number of games as Glasgow Warriors so far this campaign, yet sit five points adrift of the Scottish side as only three of their eight victories have been earned with a bonus point.
Thankfully for the region’s fans, defence has not been an issue. Only Leinster have conceded fewer tries than the Ospreys this term and Shaun Edwards’ work with Brad Davis is clearly paying off.
Defence will be crucial if Clarke’s side are to stop a Glasgow attack that has scored 48 tries when they visit Scotstoun on January 25, to start a run of four potentially season-defining fixtures.
New Year wish: In Sam Davies, Owen Watkin, George North and Luke Morgan, the Ospreys have players that can open up defences. But they need to do so on a more consistent basis if the region is to secure a play-off place.
Conference B
Dragons
Position: 6th
It was all change at the Dragons last month as Bernard Jackman paid the price for a second season of struggle on the Rodney Parade pitch.
Chairman David Buttress had hoped to bring in an interim head coach ahead of the festive derbies but, following talks with Wales defence coach Shaun Edwards, opted instead to delay his decision and name a permanent replacement this month.
Jackman believes whoever comes in will benefit from the work he did during his 18 months in the hot seat and there have been positive signs in the last three matches.
What fans wanted most of all was to be competitive and hard to beat, and that has been the case in the recent derbies.
Under the guidance of Ceri Jones, the Dragons earned a first win over a rival region in four years with a victory against the Ospreys that was sandwiched between narrow defeats to the Cardiff Blues and Scarlets.
In those three matches the Dragons conceded 63 points, just four more than they had shipped against Leinster in what proved a damaging 59-10 home defeat on December 1.
The Dragons’ problems did not begin and end with Jackman, and talk surrounding whether the region will become a de facto development side continues to swirl.
But the performances in the derbies have given the players and coaching staff something to build on.
New Year wish: Buttress will hope to appoint a new permanent head coach this month, but more long-term concerns persist. If the Dragons are ever going to challenge on the pitch then their chairman must make good on promises to drive new revenue streams – starting with the redevelopment of the North Terrace at Rodney Parade.
Scarlets
Position: 4th
“West is Best” boasts the West Stand of the Parc y Scarlets, but that motto has rung a little hollow over the past few weeks.
Injuries have crippled the Scarlets’ season with head coach Wayne Pivac describing the current list of casualties as the worst he has faced in his 22 years as a coach.
Space in the region’s treatment room was at a premium last week with 14 players sidelined from Saturday’s clash with the Dragons.
The Scarlets have been hit particularly hard in the back-row – half of those currently working with the physio play there – and Pivac was forced to field captain Ken Owens at number eight for the final festive derby.
At a time when the region already had to deal with the loss of Tadhg Beirne, and the increased expectation that comes with reaching back-to-back PRO12/14 finals and the last four of the Champions Cup, it has not been ideal.
Victory over the Dragons on Saturday – which halted a run of five straight defeats – was therefore a timely fillip as well as a great way for Scarlets fans to start the new year.
Those supporters will have renewed hope for a play-off push, while Pivac will want to ease the injury crisis over the next fortnight with the Scarlets already eliminated from the Champions Cup.
It will not be easy, though, as the Scarlets face Leinster, Munster, Cardiff Blues and Edinburgh before the end of the regular season.
New Year wish: Not so much a wish, more a plea to the rugby gods. The Scarlets’ medical department will be working overtime between now and January 25, when the region travel to Dublin to face Leinster. They are rightly treading carefully with Leigh Halfpenny’s concussion but need the likes of Jake Ball, James Davies, Rhys Patchell and Blade Thomson back pronto.
Comments on RugbyPass
We’re building a bridge but can't agree where the river is.
2 Go to commentsfirst no arms shoulder or helmet tackle into his rib cage is going to be so very painful even to watch. go back to RU mate.
1 Go to commentsBulls by 5. Plus another 50.
3 Go to commentsJohan Goosen avatar. Cute. Surely someone at RP knows how to do a google image search?
3 Go to commentsCan’t these games play a little earlier? Asking for a friend.
3 Go to commentsIt’s impressive that we can see huge stadiums with attendance in the 40 000 to 50 000 region. It shows how popular this competition is becoming. What is even more impressive is the massive growth in broadcast viewership. The URC is one of the two best leagues in the World, the other being the Top14.
7 Go to commentsChristie is not Sottish, like the majority of the Scotland team.
2 Go to commentsHold the phone, decline over-rated. Is it a one game, dead cat bounce or the real thing? Has the Penney dropped? Stay tuned.
45 Go to commentsTotally deserved win for the Crusaders Far smarter than the Chiefs who seem to be avoiding the basics when it matters Hotham showed them what was missing and Hannah seems a real find - a tad light but that can be fixed over time
8 Go to commentsGreat insight into the performance culture with Sarries and I predict Christie will be a fixture in the Scotland team now for some time to come. However, he is slightly missing his own point around Scotland “being soft” when he cites physicality examples in defence of that slight. The issue is much closer to the example he referenced around feeling off before a game but being told “it doesn’t matter, you can still play well” by Farrell. Until Scotland can get their psyche in that square, they will carry on folding under extreme pressure…
2 Go to comments> We are having to adapt, evolve and innovate more than when we were in Super Rugby where there was only really one style that everybody had to play to gain the most success. Have = able to? Interesting what that one style might be? I thought SA sides still had bad tours now, or at least bad schedule, months away? Those extra few hours flights have to be a killer though, no surprise to see their sides doing so badly at the start of the season each year. I wouldn’t enjoy that unfairness as a supporter.
7 Go to commentsThe problem for NZ, and Aus, is they ripped up the SR model and lost a massive chunk of revenue that hasn’t been replaced. Don’t forget SA clubs went North because they were left with no choice, Argy unceremoniously binned and Japan cast adrift. Now SR wasn’t perfect, far from it, but they’ve jumped into something without an effective plan, so far, to replace what they’ve lost. The biggest revenue potential now lies in Japan but it won’t be easy or quick to unlock, they are incredibly insular in culture as a nation. In the meantime, there is a serious time bomb sitting under SH rugby and if it happens then the current financial challenges will look like a picnic. IF the Boks follow their provincial teams and head north then it’s revenue meltdown. Not guaranteed to happen but the status quo is a very odd hybrid, with the Boks pointing one way and the clubs pointing the other way. And for as long as that remains then the threat is real.
45 Go to commentsI think Etene has had some good tuition, likely while at the Warriors to be a professional that helped his rugby jump, but he was certainly thrown in the deep end way too early. Should have arguably 20 less SR caps, and therefor a way better record that he does at his age, but his development would have been fast tracked by the need to satiate his signing away from league. Again, credit to him and others that he has done it so well. Easy to fall over under that pressure in the big leagues like that but he kept at it when I myself wasn’t sure he was good enough.
1 Go to commentsAwesome story. I wonder what a bigger American (SA) scene might have mean for Brex.
1 Go to comments“Johnny McNicholl and the Crusaders” save a Penney. Who has been in camp this week and showed them how to play?
8 Go to commentsSo, reports of the Crusaders’ demise / terminal decline are perhaps just - slightly - premature/exaggerated…? 🤔 Will we see a deep-dive into that by the estimable Rugbypass scribes, and maybe one or two mea culpas? Thought not.
8 Go to comments1. The Chiefs are rudderless without DMac, which enhances his AB chances 2. Chiefs pack are powderpuffs. The hard men arent there anymore 3. They had their golden title chance last yr and wont threaten this yr. Gone in second round of playoffs.
8 Go to commentsHonestly, why did you have to publish such a foolish article the day they play us? 😂
45 Go to comments> They are not standalone entities. They are linked to an amateur association which holds the FFR licence that allows the professional side to compete in the league. That’s a great rule. This looks like the chicken or egg professional scenario. How long is it going to be before the club can break even (if that is even a thing in French rugby)? If the locals aren’t into well it would be good to se them drop to amateur level (is it that far?). Hope they can reset from this level and be more practical, there will be a time when they can rebuild (if France has there setup right).
1 Go to commentsWhat about changing the ball? To something heavier and more pointed that bounces unpredictably. Not this almost round football used these days.
35 Go to comments